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THE 
CITY   OF   DREADFUL   NIGHT 


JAMES    THOMSON 


Mr.  Thomas  B.  Mosher  having  acquired  from  us 
as  proprietors  of  the  copyright  of  the  late  James 
Thomson  the  American  right  for  issuing  a  limited 
edition  of  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night,  it  is  our 
wish  that  with  him  alone  the  reprinting  of  the  poem 
should    remain. 

Bertram   Dobell. 
William   D.    Reeves. 
London,   July  25th,   1892. 


Chrly   Four   Hundred  copies  of  this  Small  Paper  Edition 
(PostSvo.)    fiave  been  printed.     Each  copy  numbered, 
and  the   type   distributed. 
No  J  ^9 


7 


Past   is  the   fear   of  future  Doubt, 
The  Sun   is   from  the  Dial  gone, 

The   Sands  are   sunk,  the  Glass   is  out, 
The  Folly  of  the  Farce  is  done." 


I 


THE  CITY  OF  DREADFUL 
NIGHT  BY  JAMES  THOM- 
SON WITH  INTRODUCTION 
BY  E.  CAVAZZA 


PRINTED  FOR  THOMAS  E.  MOSHER  AND 
PUBLISHED  BY  HIM  AT  37  EXCHANGE 
STREET     PORTLAND     MAINE     MDCCCXCII 


I 


CONTENTS 

Paob 

Introduction, xi 

The   City   of   Dreadfui.   Night.        ...  r 
Appendix  : 

To  OUR   Ladies  of   Death 77 

Insomnia 87 

Bibliography,  •    •      , 99 


513416 


INTRODUCTION 


INTRODUCTION. 


THE  CITY  OF  DREADFUL  NIGHT 
is  a  poem  of  pessimism,  which, 
neither  widely  read  nor  popular,  has,  how- 
ever, a  twofold  value  as  a  document  of  hu- 
manity and  as  an  extraordinarily  thorough 
and  vivid  representation  of  a  sole,  overmas- 
tering mood  undesirable  but  undeniable. 
Pessimism  —  whether  it  casts  an  occasional 
passing  shadow  upon  the  mind,  as  happens 
to  most  persons  ;  or  whether,  as  in  rarer 
cases,  it  hangs  a  persistent  gloomy  fog  be- 
tween a  soul  and  the  sunlight  —  always 
belongs  to  the  pathology  of  spirit  and  flesh 
interwoven.  It  is  too  often  a  malady,  subtle 
and  terrible,  a  rational  madness,  a  paraly- 
sis of  the  soul,  a  nyctalopic  sight  which  sees 
objects  clearly  defined,  black  upon  black, 
in  a  lightless  atmosphere.  Such  a  death 
in  life  we  are  bound  to  pity.  We  ought  to 
try  to  comprehend,  while  we  marvel  at  the 
spirit  that  continually  makes  the  great  re- 
fusal of  the  abundant  delights  of  the  mo- 
ment and  of  the  instincts  and  analogies 
which,  assuring  of  a  future  good,  speak   in 


XIV  INTRODUCTION. 

a  manner  unanswerable  by  the  dialectics  of 
materialism. 

In  order  to  understand  the  utterances  of 
a  sincere  pessimist  we  must  seek  for  a 
cause  more  remote  and  intricate  than  the 
disillusions  or  the  misfortunes  which  the 
sufferer  himself  is  apt  to  blame  for  his  mis- 
ery. For  it  is  not  those  most  sharply  or 
heavily  afflicted  who  fall  into  chronic  mel- 
ancholy. It  is  not  a  past  cataclysm,  but 
instead  a  natural  poverty  of  soil  which  re- 
sults in  rank  weeds  only  and  cruel  thorns. 
Upon  the  slopes  of  Etna,  many  times  ru- 
ined by  fiery  streams  —  the  lava,  after  a 
while  that  it  lies  under  the  sun,  breaks  into 
mellow  earth,  plenteous  of  olives,  vines  and 
corn. 

The  incurable  physical  sufferings  of 
Leopardi  and  of  Heine  readily  and  suffi- 
ciently account  for  their  pessimism  ex- 
pressed in  poetry;  the  one  was  like  a 
divine,  sad  nightingale,  singing  amid  a 
moonless  grove,  the  other  had  in  his  sophis- 
ticated song  the  mocking-bird's  cries  and 
laughter,  broken  and  feverishly  alternated. 

We  shall  hardly  be  able  to  read  justly 
The  City  of  Dreadful  Night,  the  unique 
and  startling  embodiment  of  the  convic- 
tions  of  James   Thomson,    without    some 


INTRODUCTION.  XV 

rapid  inquiry  into  the  causes  of  the  preva- 
lent attitude  of  his  mind.  His  was  a  sen- 
sitive, high-strung  temperament  in  prey  to 
one  relentless  mood,  which  for  many  years 
visited  him  with  increasing  frequency  and 
power,  until  it  obtained  over  him  complete 
mastery.  The  tragic  obsession  was  not, 
indeed,  without  moments  of  truce ;  but 
these  appear  excited  and  insecure  —  like 
the  respite  given  to  the  victim  of  a  tiger's 
play. 

Of  a  malady,  searching  and  gradual  as 
this  which  invaded  the  spirit  of  James 
Thomson,  it  is  not  possible  to  make  a  di- 
agnosis other  than  generalized  and  tenta- 
tive ;  for  we  must  be  aware  that  factors 
may  have  existed  which  could  throw  out 
the  whole  calculation.  His  inheritance 
from  a  mother  of  sad  temperament  and 
austere  creed,  and  from  a  father  more  or 
less  dipsomanig,c,  would  appear  to  give 
reason  enough  for  his  hypochrondria  and 
melancholy.  The  Scottish  quality  of  his 
intellect,  persistent  and  argumentative,  and 
of  his  wild  and  haunted  fantasy,  rendered 
him  ready  to  accept  the  report  of  the 
nerves  which,  themselves  unstrung,  found 
in  the  universe  only  a  clash  and  jangle  of 
false  notes,  a  confusion  of  chords  without 


XVI  INTRODUCTION. 

key  or  resolution.  Such  a  nature  as  Thom- 
son's might  easily  fall,  by  its  own  gravita- 
tion, into  despairing  pessimism.  His  rea- 
r  son  admitted  nothing  beyond  the  limits  of 
its  own  research ;  his  imagination,  strong 
enough  to  supply  his  theories  with  start- 
lingly  concrete  illustrations,  did  not  avail 
to  initiate  for  him  any  comforts  or  hopes. 
By  some  curious,  clear  glimpse  of  criticism 
he  has  defined  the  state  of  his  spirit  with 
almost  scientific  precision,  in  course  of  the 
poem  which  w£  are  about  to  read : 

What  men  are  they  who  haunt  these  fatal  glooms  ? 

They  have  much  wisdom,  yet  they  are  not  wise, 

They  have  much  goodness,  yet  they  do  not  well  .  . 

They  are  most  rational  and  yet  insane ; 

An  outward  madness  not  to  be  controlled  ; 

A  perfect  reason  in  the  central  brain, 

Which  has  no  power,  but  sitteth  wan  and  cold, 

And  sees  the  madness,  and  foresees  as  plainly 

The  ruin  in  its  path,  and  trieth  vainly 

To  cheat  itself,  refusing  to  behold. 

In  this  piteous  vivisection  it  may  not  be 
overfanciful  to  recognize  the  peculiar  sec- 
ond-sight of  the  poet's  self,  his  double  met 
face  to  face.  This  vivid  division  of  per- 
sonality —  said  to  be  a  symptom  of  un- 
soundness of  brain  —  appears  in  other  ex- 
amples, still  more  marked,  in  the  imagery 
of  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


INTRODUCTION.  XVII 

Thomson  himself  believed  that  the  one 
cause  of  his  long  and  ever-deepening  mis- 
ery was  the  death  of  his  betrothed,  Matilda 
Weller,  a  beautiful  girl  hardly  beyond  child- 
hood. A  similar  experience  befell  Novalis, 
as  is  known  ;  and  in  honor  of  this  corre- 
spondence in  grief,  Thomson  assumed  as 
part  of  his  pseudonym  the  anagram  Vano- 
lis.  Bysshe  Vanolis  was  the  name  which 
he  chose  for  himself,  and  he  desired  that 
his  publications  should  be  signed  merely 
with  the  initials  B.  V. 

In  regard  to  the  effect  of  the  early  sor- 
row upon  Thomson's  view  of  life,  Carlyle's 
criticism  upon  the  case  of  Novalis  need 
not  be  cited  here ;  but  preferably  that  of 
an  essayist  who  wrote  directly  concerning 
Thomson  :  — 

I  do  not  agree  ...  as  r^arding  this  l^ereave- 
ment  as  the  cause  of  his  lifelong  misery.  .She  was, 
I  hold,  merely  the  peg  on  which  he  hung  his  rai- 
ment of  sorrow;  without  her,  another  object  might 
have  served  the  same  purpose.  He  carried  with 
him  his  proper  curse,  constitutional  melancholia. 

At  the  same  time  must  be  admitted  the 
judicious  observation  of  Thomson's  biog- 
rapher, Mr.  H.  S.  Salt,  who  believes  that 
the  death  of  the  young  girl,  more  than  any 
other  single  circumstance,    "  fostered    and 


XVIII  INTRODUCTION. 

developed  the  malady  to  which  Thomson 
was  perhaps  predisposed." 

Another  memorialist,  Mr.  Bertram  Do- 
bell,  suggests  that  Thomson  had  "  much  in 
him,  in  fact,  of  the  self-torturing  spirit 
which  afflicted  Rousseau,  and  which  drove 
Cowper  into  insanity." 

For  consciousness  turned  in  against  it- 
self there  is  no  defence;  this  intimate  war- 
fare means  total  defeat ;  and  the  longer 
the  resistance  the  slower  the  torment  and 
the  devastation. 

Were  these  few  pages  the  preface  to  a 
volume  which  should  represent  the  various 
themes  and  moods  expressed  by  the  entire 
range  of  Thomson's  writings,  it  would  be 
opportune  to  do  more  than  merely  hint  at 
the  sensitive  capacity  for  enjoyment,  the 
affectionate  and  companionable  traits  of 
the  man,  the  loyal  friendships  which  he 
inspired,  and  the  energetic  —  yet  half-heart- 
ed and  intermittent  —  efforts  made  by  him 
against  the  forces  of  outward  conditions, 
inward  discouragements,  and  the  unfortu- 
nate habit  inherited  from  his  father,  which 
from  time  to  time  overtaking  him,  became 
at  last  the  means  of  a  slow,  not  unwilling, 
suicide. 

But   it   is   a  single  poem.     The    City   of 


INTRODUCTION.  XIX 

Dreadful  Night  (with,  as  illustration,  To 
our  Ladies  of  Death  and  Insomnia,  the  lat- 
ter commenting  upon  it  in  its  own  to- 
nality) that  I  am  invited  to  present  to 
American  readers.  This,  then,  is  the  time 
and  place  for  appreciation  of  the  unique 
and  sinister  beauty  of  a  work  that  has 
called  forth  the  praise  of  such  artists  as 
Swinburne,  Rossetti,  Philip  Bourke  Mars- 
ton,  while  on  this  side  of  the  Atlantic, 
Longfellow  and  Emerson  expressed  their 
interest  in  its  fame.  Under  the  darkness']* 
of  deep  waters,  within  the  shell  of  pessi-/ 
mism,  grew  this  rare  product  of  disease] 
the  black  pearl  of  poetry  that  is  namedl 
The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

Although  this  poem  is  justly  to  be  con- 
sidered as  the  definitive  word  of  James 
Thomson's  criticism  Qf  life,  as  well  as  the 
crowning  example  of  his  literary  art,  it 
would  be  unfair  to  ignore  the  testimony 
contained  in  a  note  addressed  by  him  to 
George  Eliot,  in  sending  to  her  a  copy  of 
the  book  :    -^ 

The  poem  in  question  (he  wrote  to  her)  was  the 
result  of  sleepless  hypochondria.  I  am  aware  that 
the  truth  of  midnight  does  not  exclude  the  truth  of 
noonday,  though  one's  nature  may  lead  him  to 
dwell  in  the  former  rather  than  the  latter. 


XX  INTRODUCTION. 

But  in  the  time  that  he  was  writing  the 
poem,  for  him  the  noonday  was  as'  though 
it  never  had  been.  The  work  has  the  tre- 
mendous vividness  of  utter  possession  by 
one  fixed  idea.  The  powers  of  darkness 
have  created,  saying,  Let  there  not  be 
light. 

The  City  of  Dreadful  Nighf  was  imag- 
ined during  a  sojourn  in  London,  where 
the  environment  and  the  climate  added  to 
the  depression  of  Thomson's  spirits.  In 
order  to  find  some  relief  from  the  conscious 
nightmare  of  insomnia  he  was 

Constrained  to  move  through  the  unmoving  hours, 
Accursed  from  rest  because  the  hours  stood  still. 

He  walked  the  streets  of  London,  silent 
and  lonely  in  the  darkness  of  midnight,  or 
stood  upon  the  bridge  looking  down  into 
the  black,  sullen  waters,  until  the  dawn 
sent  him  shivering  to  his  house.  These 
are  the  scenes  which  reappear  in  the  City 
of  Night  and  its  River  of  the  Suicides. 
The  dismal  town  is,  indeed,  a  fata  morgana 
of  London  projected  upon  a  cloud.  Its 
architecture  is  the  frozen  music  of  a  dead 
march  heard  in  the  insomnia  that  has  the 
illusions  without  the  repose  of  dreams. 

This  city  was  not  built  in  a  day ;  its  con- 


INTRODUCTION.  XXI 

structor  had  served  a  long  apprenticeship 
before  he  reared  the  image  of  the  goddess 
Melencholia  upon  the  pedestal.  For  James 
Thomson  all  roads  led  to  this  Rome,  the 
capital  of  the  empire  of  the  Inane.  He  had 
written,  at  the  age  of  twentj'-three,  "  The 
Doom  of  a  City,"  an  allegory  (as  Mr.  Salt 
defines  it)  of^the-^ony  insensibility  of  the 
human  heart  when  numbed  by  destiny  and 
despair.  The  motive  was  taken  from  the 
petrified  city  of  one  of  the  Arabian  Nights' 
tales.  In  The  Festival  of  Life,  interrupted 
by  two  masks  of  Death  kindly  or  cruel ;  in 
the  wild  utterances  of  the  Mater  Tenebra- 
rum,  the  composed  solemnity  of  Our  Ladies 
of  Death,  or  the  funereal  descriptions  of 
the  shadowy  abode  of  the  Lady  of  Sor- 
row—  the  imagination  of  Thomson  was 
always  approaching  i^s  ideal  and  reinforc- 
ing its  art  for  the  masterwork  of  the  The 
City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

In  the  proem  is  announced  the  double 
purpose  of  the  allegory :  "  To  show  the 
bitter,  old  and  naked  truth  "  as  it  appears 
to  the  view  of  the  pessimist,  and  to  console 
in  some  degree  the  brethren  of  the  great 
"  Freemasonry  of  Sorrow,"  by  the  grip  and 
password  of  initia^  sympathy.  And  there 
is  a  tinge  of  satisfaction  and  exclusiveness 


XXII  INTRODUCTION. 

in  the  poet's  declaration  that  none  who 
have  content  or  hope  for  reason  of  this 
world  or  the  other,  could  "  read  the  writing 
if  they  deigned  to  try."'  Surely  there  are 
few  persons  who  have  not  learned  by  expe- 
rience of  sorrow,  even  though  refusing  to 
let  one's  individual  cloud  discredit  the  sun. 
The  attempt  may  be  modestly  made,  at 
least,  to  spell  out  the  hyacinthine  hiero- 
glyphics that  inscribe  woe  upon  the  pages 
of  the  poem.  And  it  may  be  that  non-per- 
suasion will  leave  the  reader  more  at  lib- 
erty to  appreciate  its  extraordinary  literary 
merit. 

The  atmosphere  of  The  City  of  Dreadful 
Night  is  symbolic  of  the  unrelieved  gloom 
of  pessimism  ;  its  dwellers  typify  those  who 
habitually  despond,  admitting  no  consola- 
tion or  hope.  The  poet  asserts  the  power 
of  hypochondria  to  materialize  its  frightful 
imaginings. 

But  when  a  dream  night  after  night  is  brought 
Throughout  a  week,  and  such  weeks  few  or  many 
Recur  each  year  for  several  years,  can  any 

Discern  that  dream  from  real  life  in  aught  ? 

The  simple  verity  of  the  pathetic  plea 
cannot  fail  to  awaken  compassion  for  the 
sufferings  of  Thomson   and  admiration  of 


INTRODUCTION,  XXIII 

the  literary  art  which  could  so  steadily  de- 
pict the  images  of  his  vast  discouragement. 

The  scenery  of  the  city  is  varied;  the  sul-  I 
len  lagoon  and  marsh,  the  savage  forests  r 
and  the  torrents  running  downward  through  I, 
black  ravines,  are  its  sombre  environment,!, 
allegorical  of  despair  in  its  apathetic  or  its ' 
violent  forms.     The  streets  of  the  city  are 
lined  with  ancient  ruins  or  with  houses  in- 
habited, but  showing  no  light  through  their 
black  casements.     Only  the  street    lamps 
burn  —  as  Thomson  saw  them,  a  perspec- 
tive of  innumerable  points  of  sharp  fire,  as 
he  walked  through  London  at  night. 

"  The  City  is  of  Night  but  not  of  Sleep," 
it  is  the  home  of  insomnia,  with  all  its  at- 
tendant terrors.  We  may  not  overlook  the 
pathological  origin  of  the  poem.  The  tech- 
nical construction  of  the  allegory  includes 
a  principal  verse-form  employed  in  the  pas- 
sages which  describe  the  common  doom  of 
the  people,  hopeless  under  the  hand  of 
Necessity.  Its  metre  is  a  seven-line 
stanza,  to  which  the  double  rhymes  of  the 
fifth  and  sixth  lines  give  a  peculiar  tender- 
ness. In  the  episodes,  where  individuals 
are  heard  as  the  spokesmen  of  a  whole  sad 
company,  various  metres  are  adopted  with 
appropriateness  to  the  passion   expressed. 


XXIV  INTRODUCTION. 

The  general  design  is  at  once  elaborate 
and  somewhat  fragmentary;  a  series  of  pow- 
erful visions,  not  without  mathematical 
correspondences  of  structure,  convey  the 
allegory. 

Despair  is  above  all  egoistic ;  therefore 
every  figure  met  by  the  poet  in  those  for- 
lorn streets  is  an  image  of  himself,  and 
gives  voice  to  one  or  another  phase  of  his 
mood.  The  first  of  these  citizens  is  a  man 
whose  faith  was  buried  in  a  graveyard,  and 
whose  love  and  hope  were  departed  in  their 
turn.  He  remains  deprived  of  all  aim  in 
life,  which  for  him  runs  on  like  the  mechan- 
ism of  a  watch  without  dial  or  hands. 

The  poet  describes  the  new  power  of  his 
visual  nerve  by  which  he  can  perceive  "  a 
stir  of  black  in  blackness,"  and  the  sharp- 
ened hearing  that  reports  the  pulsations  of 
silence.  Then  he  comes  upon  a  man  who 
is  relating  to  a  shadowy  crowd  of  listeners 
his  strange  journey ;  each  stanza  is  intro- 
duced by  the  impressive  repetition  : 

As  I  came  through  tlie  desert  thus  it  was, 
As  I  came  through  the  desert. 

(Perhaps  there  is  no  need  to  point  out 
a  degree  of  resemblance  of  this  episode  to 
Browning's  (Jhilde  Roland.  Thomson  was 
receptive   and  even  imitative,  yet  had  no 


INTRODUCTION.  XXV 

lack  of  vigorous  originality  which  was  able 
to  give  a  new  stamp  to  his  borrowings.) 
There  in  the  w^ste  land,  among  the  savage 
crags  of  a  wild  seacoast,  between  a  burnt- 
out  sun  and  a  fallen  moon,  the  traveler 
meets  a  woman,  carrying  in  her  hand  a  red 
lamp,  which  is  no  less  than  her  own  burn- 
ing heart.  She  has  been  identified  by  Mr. 
Salt  as  "the  phantom-figure  of  the  lost 
love  "  of  the  poet ;  and  this  interpretation 
has  the  double  authority  of  intelligence  and 
of  affection.  But  it  is  not  easy  to  imagine 
the  transformation  of  the  golden-haired 
child  into  this  tragic  woman.  Rather,  the 
lamp-bearer  appears  like  a  demi-goddess,  a 
Lady  of  Death,  who  carries  away  her  lov- 
er's self  from  himself,  in  a  mad  division  of 
identity. 

Next,  the  poet  overhears  a  dialogue  of 
two  persons  who  have  failed  of  admittance 
at  the  gates  of  death  because  they  lacked 
the  coin  of  the  toll  —  a  last  hope  to  leave 
behind.  Another  pair  reason  concerning 
Fate,  whether  she  is  malign,  a  hater  of  men, 
or  simply  indifferent.  Then  with  noise 
of  heavy  wheels  and  clangor  of  iron-shod 
hoofs,  as  in  the  London  streets,  great  wains 
go  by,  bearing  away, — who  knows  ? — all  the 
good  that  might  have  been  for  mankind. 


XXVI  INTRODUCTION. 

Now  the  wanderer  approaches  a  house, 
draped  with  black,  from  whose  windows  — 
alone  of  all  the  city  —  streams  a  light  of 
funeral  lamps.  This  episode  is  another 
reference  to  the  story  in  the  Arabian  Nights 
which  so  deeply  impressed  Thomson.  In 
the  oratory  of  this  house  of  mourning,  of 
which  every  room  holds  a  shrine  where  ta- 
pers burn  before  a  statue  or  a  picture  of 
the  same  woman,  "very  young  and  very 
fair  "  a  youth  kneels  praying  beside  the  bier 
where  lies  the  dead  Lady  of  the  Images. 
In  this  chapelle  ardetite  is  the  celebration  of 
the  early  sorrow  of  the  poet,  the  worship  of 
the  love  that  he  had  not  the  strength  to  lift 
^p  from  the  earth  to  the  stars. 

In  a  remarkable  passage,  to  which  refer- 
ence has  already  been  made,  the  poet  anat- 
omizes the  melancholy  of  the  "  rational  and 
yet  insane  "  dwellers  in  the  City  of  Night. 
Now  they  at  the  door  of  the  great  cathe- 
dral of  their  town  attest  each  his  right  to 
citizenship,  since  they  from  the  illusions  of 
power,  art,  wealth,  virtue,  vice,  knowledge, 
patriotism,  "wake  from  daydreams  to  this 
real  night." 

Within  the  sinister  temple  the  poet  med- 
itates upon  the  folly  of  those  who,  hating 
time,  yet  crave  eternity  ;    and  then  hears 


INTRODUCTION.  XXVII 

the  voice  of  the  preacher  who  bids  his  sad 
people  take  comfort  from  the  assurance  of 
the  oblivion  of  the  tomb,  and  declares  that 
Fate  knows  neither  favor  nor  wrath.  One 
in  the  congregation  persists  in  arraigning 
life  for  the  chances  of  happiness  proffered 
and  frustrated,  to  which  the  preacher  can 
only  repeat  his  doctrine  of  oblivion.  The 
poet,  ranging  in  thought  among  other 
spheres,  finds  only  infinite  room  for  despair 
and  for  compassion.  He  returns  to  the 
sights  of  the  City  where  he  perceives  a  man 
groping  upon  the  ground  in  search  of  the 
golden  clue  that  shall  lead  him  backward 
to  the  day  of  his  birth;  others  seek  the 
lethal  river  of  the  suicides. 

The  succeeding  allegory  is  very  impres- 
sive, wMch  depicts  the  struggle  of  man-, 
kind  against  Fate,  ^nd  the  resultant  defeat 
and  dejection.  The  cathedral  is  fiooded 
now  with  moonlight ;  in  the  open  space  be- 
fore it  crouches  a  Sphinx,  half  in  shadow, 
while  an  angel  all  in  the  full  white  splen- 
dor, confronts  the  creature.  In  the  first 
shock  of  conflict  the  wings  of  the  angel  fall 
shattered.  He  remains  an  armed  warrior, 
but  his  sword  is  broken  at  the  second  en- 
counter. Lastly,  he  is  a  defenseless  man, 
praying  with  uplifted  hands,  and  is  crushed 


XXVIII  INTRODUCTION. 

by  the  unalterable  sphinx.  These  meta- 
morphoses ( as  Mr.  Salt  has  well  interpreted 
them  )  may  be  taken  to  represent  the  three 
phases  through  which  the  poet's  mind  had 
passed  in  relation  to  the  mysteries  of  ex- 
istence ;  first,  the  exaltation  of  religious  be- 
lief ;  then  the  self-reliance  of  philosophy ; 
then  the  hopelessness  of  complete  despair. 

To  the  northward  of  the  City  of  Dread- 
ful Night  the  bronze  image  of  its  tutelar 
goddess  sits  upon  a  granite  pedestal.  She 
is  the  tremendous  Melencholia  of  Albrecht 
Diirer,  surrounded  by  the  emblems  of  every 
human  science ;  she  has  toiled  and  is  baf- 
fled at  the  end  of  the  day,  and  the  denial 
of  all  things  is  in  her  eyes.  To  her  the 
dwellers  of  the  tenebrous  town  look  to  ob- 
tain new  endurances  or  new  terrors.  She 
confirms  to  all  the  old  despair. 

In  the  magnificent  eleven  stanzas  which 
describe  this  defeated  Titan  woman  may  be 
found  the  summing-up  of  James  Thomson's 
whole  philosophy  of  pessimism,  expressed 
with  a  fury  of  conviction  able  to  fuse  the 
material  into  one  great  image,  unique  and 
memorable. 

E.  CAVAZZA. 

November,  1892. 


THE 
CITY    OF    DREADFUL    NIGHT 

1870;    [874. 


"  Per  me  si  va  nella  citta  dolente." 

'  Poi  di  tanto  adoprar,  di  tanti  moti 
D'ogni  celeste,  ogni  terrena  cosa,- 
Girando  senza  posa, 
Per  tornar  sempre  la  donde  son  rnosse ; 
Uso  alcuno,  alcun  frutto 
Indovinar  non  so." 


Dante 


Sola  nel  mondo  eterna,  a  cui  si  volve 

Ogni  creata  cosa, 

In  te,  morte,  si  posa 

Nostra  ignuda  natura ; 

Lieta  no,  ma  sicura 

Deir  antico  dolor.     .     .     . 

Pero  ch'  esser  beato 

Nega  ai  mortali  e  nega  a'  morti  il  fato." 

—  Leopardi. 


THE 
CITY    OF    DREADFUL    NIGHT. 

1870;  1874. 


PROEM. 

LO,  thus,  as  prostrate,  "  In  the  dust  I  write 
My  heart's  deep  languor  and  my  soul's  sad  tears.' 
Yet  why  evoke  the  spectres  of  black  night 
To  blot  the  sunshine  of  exultant  ypafs  ? 
Why  disinter  d^d  faith  from  mouldering  hidden  ? 
Why  break  the  seals  of  mute  despair  unbidden. 
And  wail  life's  discords  into  careless  ears  ? 

Because  a  cold  rage  seizes  one  at  whiles 
To  show  the  bitter  old  and  wrinkled  truth 

Stripped  naked  of  all  vesture  that  beguiles, 
False  dreams,  false  hopes,  false  masks  and  modes  of  youth  : 

Because  it  gives  some  sense  of  power  and  passion 

In  helpless  impotence  to  try  to  fashion 
Our  woe  in  living  words  howe'er  uncouth. 


4  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night, 

Surely  I  write  not  for  the  hopeful  young, 

Or  those  who  deem  their  happiness  of  worth. 

Or  such  as^  pasture  and  grow  fat  among 

The  shows  of  life  and  feel  nor  doubt  nor  dearth, 

Or  pious  spirits  with  a  God  above  them 

To  sanctify  and  glorify  and  love  them. 
Or  sages  who  foresee  a  heaven  on  earth. 

For  none  of  these  I  write,  and  none  of  these 
Could  read  the  writing  if  they  deigned  to  try : 

So  may  they  flourish,  in  their  due  degrees, 
On  our  sweet  earth  and  in  their  unplaced  sky. 

If  any  cares  for  the  weak  words  here  written. 

It  must  be  some  one  desolate,  Fate-smitten, 

Whose  faith  and  hope  are  de^d,  and  who  would  die. 

Yes,  here  and  there  some  weary  wanderer 
In  that  same  city  of  tremendous  night, 

Will  understand  the  speech,  and  feel  a  stir 
Of  fellowship  in  all-disastrous  fight ; 

"  I  suffer  mute  and  lonely,  yet  another 

jUplifts  his  voice  to  let  me  know  a  brother 

Travels  the  same  wild  paths  though  out  of  sight." 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

O  sad  Fraternity^do  I  unfold 

Your  dolorous  mysteries  shrouded  from  of  yore  ? 
Nay,  be  assured ;  no  secret  can  be  told 

To  any  who  divined  it  not  before  : 
None  uninitiate  by  many  a  presage 
Will  comprehend  the  language  of  the  message, 

Although  proclaimed  aloud  forevermore. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


/         I  i/ 

THE  City  is  o|  Nfght;  perchance  of  Q^th,      ^ 
But  cert^nly  of  Night ;  for  never  there         ^ 
Can  come  th^luci^  morning's  fragrant  breath 

After  the,  dewy  dawning's  cold  grey  air ; 
The  moon  and  stars  may  shine  with  scorn  or  pity ; 
The  sun  has  never  visited  that  city, 
For  it  dissolveth  in  the  daylight  fair. 

Dissolveth  like  a  dream  of  night  away ; 

Though  present  in  distempered  gloom  of  thought 
And  deadly  weariness  of  heart  all  day. 

But  when  a  dream  night  after  night  is  brought 
Throughout  a  week,  and  such  we^ks  few  or  many 
Recur  each  ye^r  for  several  ;^^rs,  can  any 

Discern  that  dream  from  real  life  in  aught .'' 

For  life  is  but  a  dream  whose  shapes  return, 
Some  frequently,  some  seldom,  some  by  night 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

And  some  by  day,  some  night  and  day :  we  learn, 

The  while  all  change  and  many  vanish  quite, 
In  their  recurrence  with  recurrent  changes 
A  certain  seeming  order ;  where  this  ranges 
We  count  things  real ;  such  is  memory's  might. 

A  river  girds  the  city  west  and  south, 

The  main  north  channel  of  a  broad  lagoon, 

Regurging  with  the  salt  tides  from  the  mouth ; 
Waste  marshes  shine  and  glister  to  the  moon 

For  leagues,  then  moorland  black,  then  stony  ridges  ; 

Great  piers  and  causeways,  many  noble  bridges, 
Connect  the  town  and  islet  suburbs  strewn. 

Upon  an  easy  slope  it  lies  at  large. 

And  scarcely  overlaps  the  long  curved  crest 

Which  swells  out  two  leagues  from  the  river  marge. 
A  trackless  wilderness  rolls  north  and  west. 

Savannahs,  savage  woods,  enormous  mountains. 

Bleak  uplands,  black  ravines  with  torrent  fountains ; 
And  eastward  rolls  the  shipless  sea's  unrest. 


8  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

The  city  is  not  ruinous,  although 

(Treat  ruins  of  an  unremembered  past, 

With  others  of  a  few  short  y^^s  ago 

More  sad,  are  found  within  its  precincts  vast. 

The  street-lamps  always  burn  ;  but  scarce  a  casement 

In  house  or  palace  front  from  roof  to  basement 
Doth  glow  or  deam  athwart  the  mirk  air  cast. 


The  street-lamps  burn  amidst  the  baleful  glooms, 
Amidst  the  soundless  solitudes  immense 

Of  ranged  mansions  dark  and  still  as  tombs. 
The  silence  which  benumbs  or  strains  the  sense 

Fulfils  with  awe  the  soul's  despair  unweeping : 

Myriads  of  habitants  are  ever  sleeping. 
Or  deid,  or  tied  from  nameless  pestilence ! 

Yet  as  in  some  necropolis  you  find 

Perchance  one  mourner  to  a  thousand  dead, 

So  there ;  worn  faces  that  look  d^af  and  blind 
Like  tragic  masks  of  stone.     With  weary  tread, 

Each  wrapt  in  his  own  doom,  they  wander,  wander, 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  9 

Or  sit  foredone  and  desolately  ponder 

Through  sleepless  JjetTrs  with  heavy  drooping  head. 

Mature  men  chiefly,  few  in  age  or  youth,  '^' 

A  woman  rarely,  now  and  then  a  child  : 
A  child  !   If  here  the  heart  turns  sick  with  ruth 

To  see  a  little  one  from  birth  defiled, 
Or  lame  or  blind,  as  preordained  to  languish 
Through  youthless  life,  think  how  it  bleeds  with  anguish 

To  meet  one  erring  in  that  homeless  wild. 

They  often  murmur  to  themselves,  they  speak 

To  one  another  seldom,  for  their  woe 
Broods  maddening  inwardly  and  scorns  to  wreak 

Itself  abroad ;  and  if  at  whiles  it  grow 
To  frenzy  which  must  rave,  none  heeds  the  clamour, 
Unless  there  waits  some  victim  of  like  g;l_amour, 

To  rave  in  turn,  who  lends  attentive  show.   <S^  *^fl/»tf**-*-*^4 


t^ 


The  City  is  of  Night,  but  not  of  Sleep ; 

There  sweet  sleep  is  not  for  the  weary  brain 


^ 


lo  The  City  of  Dreadful  Ni^ht. 

The  pitiless  hc<urs  like  years  and  ages  creep, 

A  night  seems  termless  hell.     This  dreadful  strain 

Of  thought  and  consciousness  which  never  ceases, 

Or  which  some  moments'  stupor  but  increases, 

This,  worse  than  woe,  makes  wretches  there  insane. 

^--'  ■ 
They  leave  all  hope  behind  who  enter  there :    -'    "' 

One  certitude  while  sane  they  cannot  leave, 
One  anodyne  for  torture  and  despair ; 

The  certitude  of  E^th,  which  no  reprieve 
Can  put  off  long;  and  which,  divinely  tender, 
But  waits  the  outstretched  hand  to  promptly  render 

That  draught  whose  slumber  nothing  can  bereave.' 

1  Though  the  Garden  of  thy  Life  be  wholly  waste,  the  sweet  flowers 
withered,  the  fruit-trees  barren,  over  its  wall  hang  ever  the  rich  dark 
clusters  of  the  Vine  of  Death,  within  easy  reach  of  thy  Jliand,  which 
may  pluck  of  them  when  it  will. 


Thf  City  of  Dreadful  Nighi. 


II 


BECAUSE  he  seemed  to  walk  with  an. intent 
I  followed  him  ;  who,  shadowlike  and  frail, 
Unswervingly  though  slowly  onward  went. 

Regardless,  wrapt  in  thought  as  in  a  veil : 
Thus  step  for  step  with  lonely  sounding  feet 
We  travelled  many  a  long  dim  silent  street. 

At  length  he  paused  :  a  black  mass  in  the  gloom, 
A  tower  that  merged  into  the  heavy  sky ; 

Around,  the  huddled  stones  of  grave  and  tomb  : 
Some  old  God's-acre  now  corruption's  sty : 

He  murmured  to  himself  with  dull  despair, 

Here  Faith  dib^d,  poisoned  by  this  charnel  air. 

Then  turning  to  the  right  went  on  once  more, 
And  travelled  weary  roads  without  suspense ; 

And  reached  at  last  a  low  wall's  open  door, 

Whose  villa  gleamed  beyond  the  foliage  dense : 


12  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

He  gazed,  and  muttered  with  a  hard  despair, 

Here  Love  died,  stabbed  by  its  own  worshipped  pair. 

Then  turning  to  the  right  resumed  his  march, 

And  travelled  streets  and  lanes  with  wondrous  strength 

Until  on  stooping  through  a  narrow  arch 
We  stood  before  a  squalid  house  at  length : 

He  gazed,  and  whispered  with  a  cold  despair. 

Here  Hope  died,  starved  out  in  its  utmost  lair. 

When  he  had  spoken  thus,  before  he  stirred, 
I  spoke,  perplexed  by  something  in  the  signs 

Of  desolation  I  had  seen  and  heard 

In  this  drear  pilgrimage  to  ruined  shrines : 

When  Faith  and  Love  and  Hope  are  d^ad  indeed. 

Can  Life  still  live  ?     By  what  doth  it  proceed  "i 


As  whom  his  one  intense  thought  overpowers, 
He  answered  coldly.  Take  a  watch,  erase 

The  signs  and  figures  of  the  circling  hojtrrs, 
Detach  the  hands,  remove  the  dial-face ; 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  13 

The  works  proceed  until  run  down  ;  although 
Bereft  of  purpose,  void  of  use,  still  go. 

Then  turning  to  the  right  paced  on  again. 

And  traversed  squares  and  travelled  streets  whose  glooms 
Seemed  more  and  more  familiar  to  my  ken  ; 

And  reached  that  sullen  temple  of  the  tombs ; 
And  paused  to  murmur  with  the  old  despair, 
Here  Faith  died,  poisoned  by  this  charnel  air. 

I  ceased  to  follow,  for  the  knot  of  doubt 

Was  severed  sharply  with  a  cruel  knife  : 
He  circled  thus  forever  tracing  out 

The  series  of  the  fraction  left  of  Life ; 
Perpetual  recurrence  ifi  the  scoj)e 
Of  but  three  terms,  (^d  Faith,  dead  Love,  dead  Hope.' 


Life  divided  by  that  persistent  three  =  ^t5^-~  •210 


333 


J 


1 4  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night, 


III 


ALTHOUGH  lamps  burn  along  the  silent  streets : 
Even  when  moonlight  silvers  emptj'  squares 
The  dark  holds  countless  lanes  and  close  retreats ; 

But  when  the  night  its  sphereless  mantle  wears 
The  open  spaces  yawn  with  gloom  abysmal, 
The  sombre  mansions  loom  immense  and  dismal, 
The  lanes  are  black  as  subterranean  lairs. 

And  soon  the  eye  a  strange  new  vision  learns : 
^^^  The  night  remains  for  it  as  dark  and  dense, 

i    'Yet  clearly  in  this  darkness  it  discerns 

As  in  the  daylight  with  its  natural  sense ; 
'    Perceives  a  shade  in  shadow  not  obscurely, 
Pursues  a  stir  of  black  in  blackness  surely, 
Sees  spectres  also  in  the  gloom  intense. 

ijf,       The  ear,  too,  with  the  silence  vast  and  deep 
frU^  Becomes  familiar  though  unreconciled  ; 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  15 

Hears  breathings  as  of  hidden  life  asleep, 
And  muffled  throbs  as  of  pent  passions  wild, 

Far  murmurs,  speech  of  pity  or  derision  ; 

But  all  more  dubious  than  the  things  of  vision. 
So  that  it  knows  not  when  it  is  beguiled. 

No  tira€  abates  the  first  despair  and  awe, 
But  wonder  ceases  soon  ;  the  weirdest  thing 

Is  felt  least  strange  beneath  the  lawless  law 
Where  Beath-in-Life  is  the  eternal  king ; 

Crushed  impotent  beneath  this  reign  of  terror, 

Dazed  with  such  mysteries  of  woe  and  error, 

The  soul  is  top  outworn  for  wondering.  , 

^- ^^-^^_.  ^^^^  /     ^ 


/->'■ 


1 6  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


IV 


HE  stood  alone  within  the  spacious  square         /\ 
Declaiming  from  the  central  grassy  mound,  ) 
With  head  uncovered  and  with  streaming  hair, 
As  if  large  multitudes  were  gathered  round  : 
A  stalwart  shape,  the  gestures  full  of  might, 
The  glances  burning  with  unnatural  light :  — 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 

As  I  came  through  the  desert :  All  was  black, 

In  heaven  no  single  star,  on  earth  no  track; 

A  brooding  hush  without  a  stir  or  note,  ■'., 

The  air  so  thick  it  clotted  in  my  throat ; 

And  thus  for  hours ;  then  some  enormous  things 

Swooped  past  with  savage  cries  and  clanking  wings : 

But  I  strode  on  austere ; 

No  hope  could  have  no  fear. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 
As  I  came  through  the  desert :  Eyes  of  fire 
Glared  at  me  throbbing  with  a  starved  desire ; 
The  hoarse  and  heavy  and  carnivorous  breath 
Was  hot  upon  me  from  deep  jaws  of  death  ; 
Sharp  claws,  swift  talons,  fleshless  fingers  cold 
Plucked  at  me  from  the  bushes,  tried  to  hold : 

But  I  strode  on  austere ; 

No  hope  could  have  no  fear. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 
As  I  came  through  the  desert :  Lo  you,  there, 
That  hillock  burning  with  a  brazen  glare  ; 
Those  myriad  dusky  flg.mes  with  points  a-glow 
Which  writhed  and  hissed  and  darted  to  and  fro ; 
A  Sabbath  of  the  Serpents,  heaped  pell-mell 
For  Devil's  roll-call  and  some  fete  of  Hell : 

Yet  I  strode  on  austere  ; 

No  hope  could  have  no  fear. 


1 8  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 

As  I  came  through  the  desert :  Meteors  ran 

And  crossed  their  javeUns  on  the  black  sky-span; 

The  zenith  opened  to  a  gulf  of  tlame. 

The  dreadful  thunderbolts  jarred  earth's  fixed  frame ; 

The  ground  all  heaved  in  waves  of  fire  that  surged 

And  weltered  round  me  sole  there  unsubmerged  : 

Yet  I  strode  on  austere ; 

No  hope  could  have  no  fear. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 

As  I  came  through  the  desert :  Air  once  more. 

And  I  was  close  upon  a  wild  sea-shore ; 

Enormous  cliffs  arose  on  either  hand, 

The  deep  tide  thundered  up  a  league-broad  strand ; 

White  foambelts  seethed  there,  wan  spray  swept  and  flew; 

The  sky  broke,  moon  and  stars  and  clouds  and  blue : 

And  I  strode  on  austere ; 

No  hope  could  have  no  fear. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 
As  I  came  through  the  desert :  On  the  left 
The  sun  arose  and  crowned  a  broad  crag-cleft ; 
There  stopped  and  burned  out  black,  except  a  rim, 
A  bleeding  eyeless  socket,  red  and  dim  ; 
Whereon  the  moon  fell  suddenly  south-west, 
And  stood  above  the  right-hand  cliffs  at  rest : 

Still  I  strode  on  austere ; 

No  hope  could  have  no  fear. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was. 
As  I  came  through  the  desert :  From  the  right 
A  shape  came  slowly  with  a  ruddy  light ; 
A  woman  with  a  red  larnp  in  her  hand. 
Bareheaded  and  barefooted  on  that  strand ; 
O  desolation  moving  with  such  grace  ! 
O  anguish  with  such  beauty  in  thy  face  ! 
I  fell  as  on  my  bier, 
Hope  travailed  with  such  fear. 


20  llie  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 
As  I  came  through  the  desert :  I  was  twain, 
Two  selves  distinct  that  cannot  join  again  ; 
One  stood  apart  and  knew  but  could  not  stir, 
And  watched  the  other  stark  in  swoon  and  her ; 
And  she  came  on,  and  never  turned  aside, 
Between  such  sun  and  moon  and  roaring  tide  : 
And  as  she  came  more  near 
My  soul  grew  mad  with  fear. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was. 

As  I  came  through  the  desert :   Hell  is  mild 

And  piteous  matched  with  that  accursbd  wild ; 

A  large  black  sign  was  on  her  breast  that  bowed, 

A  broad  black  band  ran  down  her  snow-white  shroud 

That  lamp  she  held  was  her  own  burning  heart, 

Whose  blood-drops  trickled  step  by  step  apart : 

The  mystery  was  clear  ; 

Mad  rage  had  swallowed  fear. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night 

As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 
As  I  came  through  the  desert :  By  the  sea 
She  knelt  and  bent  above  that  senseless  me ; 
Those  lamp-drops  fell  upon  my  white  brow  there, 
She  tried  to  cleanse  them  with  her  tears  and  hair ; 
She  murmured  words  of  pity,  love,  and  woe. 
She  heeded  not  the  level  rushing  flow : 

And  mad  with  rage  and  fear, 
I  stood  stonebound  so  near. 


As  I  came  through  the  desert  thus  it  was, 
As  I  came  through  the  desert :   When  the  tide 
Swept  up  to  her  there  kneeling  by  my  side. 
She  clasped  that  corpse-like  me,  and  they  were  borne 
Away,  and  this  vile  me  was  left  forlorn  ; 
I  know  the  whole  sea  cannot  quench  that  heart, 
Or  cleanse  that  brow,  or  wash  those  two  apart : 
They  love ;  their  doom  is  drear, 
Yet  they  nor  hope  nor  fear ; 
But  I,  what  do  I  here  ? 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


HOW  he  arrives  there  none  can  clearly  know ; 
Athwart  the  mountains  and  immense  wild  tracts, 
Or  flung  a  waif  upon  that  vast  sea-flow, 
Or  down  the  river's  boiling  cataracts  : 
To  reach  it  is  as  dying  fever-stricken  ; 
To  leave  it,  slow  faint  birth  intense  pangs  quicken  ; 
And  memory  swoons  in  both  the  tragic  acts. 

But  being  there  one  feels  a  citizen  ; 

Escape  seems  hopeless  to  the  heart  forlorn  : 
Can  Death-in-Life  be  brought  to  life  again  ? 

And  yet  release  does  come ;  there  comes  a  morn 
When  he  awakes  from  slumbering  so  sweetly 
That  all  the  world  is  changed  for  him  completely, 

And  he  is  verily  as  if  new-born. 

He  scarcely  can  believe  the  blissful  change. 

He  weeps  perchance  who  wept  not  while  accurst ; 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  23 

Never  again  will  he  approach  the  range 

Infected  by  that  evil  spell  now  burst : 
Poor  wretch !  who  once  hath  paced  that  dolent  city 
Shall  pace  it  often,  doomed  beyond  all  pity, 

With  horror  ever  deepening  from  the  first. 

Though  he  possess  sweet  babes  and  loving  wife, 
A  home  of  peace  by  loyal  friendships  cheered, 

And  love  them  more  than  d^th  or  happy  life, 
They  shall  avail  not ;  he  must  dree  his  weird  ; 

Renounce  all  blessings  for  that  imprecation, 

Steal  forth  and  haunt  that  builded  desolation. 
Of  woe  and  terrors  and  thick  darkness  reared. 


24  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


VI 


I  sat  forlornly  by  the  river-side, 
And  watched  the  bridge-lamps  glow  like  golden  stars 
Above  the  blackness  of  the  swelling  tide, 

Down  which  they  struck  rough  gold  in  ruddier  bars ; 
And  heard  the  heave  and  plashing  of  the  How 
Against  the  wall  a  dozen  feet  below. 

Large  elm-trees  stood  along  that  river-walk ; 

And  under  one,  a  few  steps  from  my  seat, 
I  heard  strange  voices  join  in  stranger  talk, 

Although  I  had  not  heard  approaching  feet : 
These  bodiless  voices  in  my  waking  dream 
Flowed  dark  words  blending  with  the  sombre  stream  :  — 

And  you  have  after  all  come  back ;  come  back. 

I  was  about  to  follow  on  your  track. 

And  you  have  failed  :  our  spark  of  hope  is  black. 


The-  City  of  Dreadful  Kight.  25 

That  I  haye_failprl  is  proved  by  my  Eetlirnj  ''-''  'J^^ 
The  spark  is  quenched,  nor  ever  more  will  burn. 
But  listen  ;  and  the  story  you  shall  learn. 

I  reached  the  portal  common  spirits  fear, 
And  read  the  words  above  it,  dark  yet  clear. 
"  Leave  hope  behind,  all  ye  who  enter  here  :  " 

And  would  have  passed  in,  gratified  to  gain 
That  positive  eternity  of  pain, 
Instead  of  this  insufferable  inane. 

A  demon  warder  clutched  me,  Not  so  fast;     -' 

First  leave  your  hopes  behind  !  —  But  vears  have  passed 

Since  I  left  all  behind  me,  to  the  last : 

You  cannot  count  for  hope  with  all  your  wit, 
This  bleak  despair  that  drives  me  to  the  Pit : 
How  could  I  seek  to  enter  void  of  it  ? 

He  snarled,  What  thing  is  this  which  apes  a  soul, 
And  would  find  entrance  to  our  gulf  of  dole 
Without  the  payment  of  the  settled  toll  ? 


26  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

Outside  the  gate  he  showed  an  open  chest : 
Here  pay  their  entrance  fees  the  souls  unblest ; 
Cast  in  some  hope,  you  enter  with  the  rest. 

This  is  Pandora's  box ;  whose  lid  shall  shut, 
And  Hell-gate  too,  when  hopes  have  filled  it ;  but 
They  are  so  thin  that  it  will  never  glut. 

I  stood  a  few  steps  backwards,  desolate ; 
And  watched  the  spirits  pass  me  to  their  fate. 
And  fling  off  hope,  and  enter  at  the  gate. 

When  one  casts  off   a  load  he  springs  upright. 
Squares  back  his  shoulders,  breathes  with  all  his  might. 
And  briskly  paces  forward  strong  and  light : 

But  these,  as  if  they  took  some  burden,  bowed ; 
The  whole  frame  sank ;  however  strong  and  proud 
Before,  they  crept  in  quite  infirm  and  cowed. 

And  as  they  passed  me,  earnestly  from  each 

A  morsel  of  his  hope  I  did  beseech. 

To  pay  my  entrance ;  but  all  mocked  my  speech. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  27 

Not  one  would  cede  a  tittle  of  his  store, 
Though  knowing  that  in  instants  three  or  four 
He  must  resign  the  whole  for  evermore. 

So  I  returned.     Our  destiny  is  fell ; 

For  in  this  Limbo  we  must  ever  dwell, 

Shut  out  alike  from  Heaven  and  Earth  and  Hell, 


The  other  sighed  back,  Yea  ;  but  if  we  grope 
With  care  through  all  this  Limbo's  dreary  scope, 
We  yet  may  pick  up  some  minute  lost  hope ; 

And,  sharing  it  between  us,  entrance  win. 
In  spite  of  fiends  so  jealous  for  gross  sin  : 
Let  us  without  delay  our  search  begin. 


I 


u-^^r'"' 


28  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


VII 


SOME  say  that  phantoms  haunt  those  shadowy  streets, 
And  mingle  freely  there  with  sparse  mankind ; 
And  tell  of  ancient  woes  and  black  defeats, 
.  And  murmur  mysteries  in  the  grave  enshrined  : 
But  others  think  them  visions  of  illusion, 
Or  even  men  gone  far  in  self-confusion ;  1*  ; 

No  man  there  being  wholly  sane  in  mind.    ■ 

And  yet  a  man  who  raves,  however  mad, 

Who  bares  his  heart  and  tells  of  his  own  fall, 

Reserves  some  inmost  secret  good  or  bad : 
The  phantoms  have  no  reticence  at  all : 

The  nudity  of  flesh  will  blush  though  tameless, 

The  extreme  nudity  of  bone  grins  shameless, 
The  unsexed  skeleton  mocks  shroud  and  pall. 

I  have  seen  phantoms  there 'that  were  as  men 
And  men  that  were  as  phantoms  flit  and  roam ; 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  29 

Marked  shapes  that  were  not  living  to  my  ken, 

Caught  breathings  acrid  as  with  Qd^d  Sea  foam : 
The  City  rests  for  man  so  weird  and  awful, 
That  his  intrusion  there  might  seem  unlawful, 

And  phantoms  there  may  have  their  proper  home. 


\'' 


30  7^/^^  Ctty  of  Dreadful  Alight. 


VIII 

WHILE  T  still  lingered  on  that  river-walk^.  .-"  V-^/^ 
And  watched  the  tide  as  black  as  our  black  doom, 
I  heard  another  couple  join  in  talk, 

And  saw  them  to  the  left  hand  in  the  gloom 
Seated  against  an  elm  bole  on  the  ground, 
Their  eyes  intent  upon  the  stream  profound. 

"  I  never  knew  another  man  on  earth 

But  had  some  joy  and  solace  in  his  life, 
Some  chance  of  triumph  in  the  dreadful  strife :         ^ 
My  doom  has  been  unmitigated  dearth."  > 

"  We  gaze  upon  the  river,  and  we  note 
The  various  vessels  large  and  small  that  float. 
Ignoring  every  wrecked  and  sunken  boat." 

"  And  yet  I  asked  no  splendid  dower,  no  spoil 
Of  sway  or  fame  or  rank  or  even  wealth ; 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

But  homely  love  with  common  food  and  health. 
And  nightly  sleep  to  balance  daily  toil." 

This  ail-too  humble  soul  would  arrogate 
Unto  itself  some  signalizing  hate 
From  the  supreme  indifference  of  Fate 


H-^' 


M^ 


Who  is  most  wretched  in  this  dolorous  place  ?  ' 

.  think  myself  ;  yet  I  would  rather  be  l^--^^^^""^  ^ 

My  miserable  self  than  He,  than  He  *     \  | 

Who  formed  such  creatures  to  His  own  disgrace.      I  ^  ^ 


The  vilest  thing  must  be  less  vile  than  Thou 
From  whom  it  had  its  being,  God  and  Lord ! 
Creator  of  all  woe  and  sin !  abhorred. 

Malignant  and  implacable  !     I  vow 

'  That  not  for  all  Thy  power  furled  and  unfurled. 
For  all  the  temples  to  Thy  glory  built, 
Would  I  assume  the  ignominious  guilt 
Of  having  made  such  men  in  such  a  world."     /' 


32  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

"  As  if  a  Being,  God  or  Fiend,  could  reign, 
At  once  so  wicked,  foolish,  and  insane, 
As  to  produce  men  when  He  might  refrain  I 

"  The  world  rolls  round  forever  like  a  mill ; 
It  grinds  out  dfe^th  and  life  and  good  and  ill ; 
It  has  no  purpose,  heart  or  mind  or  will. 

/ 

"  While  air  of  Space  and  'Hriie's  full  river  flow 

The  mill  must  blindly  whirl  unresting  so  : 
It  may  be  wearing  out,  but  who  can  know  ? 

"  Man  might  know  one  thing  were  his  sight  less  dim 
That  it  whirls  not  to  suit  his  petty  whim, 
That  it  is  quite  indifferent  to  him. 

"  Nay,  does  it  treat  him  harshly  as  he  saith  ? 
It  grinds  him  some  slow  years  of  bitter  breath. 
Then  grinds  him  back  into  eternal  death." 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  33 


IX 


IT  is  full  strange  to  him  who  hears  and  feels, 
When  wandering  there  in  some  deserted  street, 
The  booming  and  the  jar  of  ponderous  wheels, 
The  trampling  clash  of  heavy  ironshod  feet : 
Who  in  this  Venice  of  the  Black  Sea  rideth  ? 
Who  in  this  city  of  the  stars  abideth 

To  b<iy  or  $611  as  those  in  daylight  sweet.? 

The  rolling  thunder  seems  to  fill  the  sky 

As  it  comes  on  ;  the  horses  snort  and  strain, 

The  harness  jingles,  as  it  passes  by; 

The  hugeness  of  an  overburthened  wain  : 

A  man  sits  nodding  on  the  shaft  or  trudges 

Three  parts  asleep  beside  his  fellow-drudges  : 
And  "SO  it  rolls  into  the  night  again. 

What  merchandise  ?  whence,  whither,  and  for  whom  i 
Ferchance  it  is  a  Fate-appointed  hearse, 

y 


34  The  City  of  Dreadful  AHght. 

Bearing  away  to  some  mysterious  tomb 

Or  Limbo  of  the  scornful  universe 
The  joy,  the  peace,  the  life-hope,  the  abortions 
Of  all  things  gjDod  which  should  have  been  our  portions, 

But  have  been  strangled  by  that  City's  curse. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  35 


THE  mansion  stood  apart  in  its  own  ground; 
In  front  thereof  a  fragrant  garden-lawn, 
High  trees  about  it,  and  the  whole  walled  round : 

The  massy  iron  gates  were  both  withdrawn ; 
And  every  window  oi  its  front  shed  light, 
Portentous  in  that  City  of  the  Night. 

But  though  thus  lighted  it  was  deadly  still 
As  all  the  countless  bulks  of  solid  gloom : 

Perchance  a  congregation  to  fulfil 
Solemnities  of  silence  in  this  doom. 

Mysterious  rites  of  dolour  and  ^SSpair 

Permitting  not  a  breath  of  chant  or  prayer  ? 

Broad  steps  ascended  to  a  terrace  broad 
Whereon  lay  still  light  from  the  open  door  ; 

The  hall  was  noble,  and  its  aspect  awed, 

Hung  round  with  heavy  black  from  dome  to  floor  ^ 


^.W 


36  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

And  ample  stairways  rose  to  left  and  right 
Whose  balustrades  were  also  draped  with  night. 

I  paced  from  room  to  room,  from  hall  to  hall. 

Nor  any  life  throughout  the  maze  discerned  ; 
But  each  was  hung  with  its  funereal  pall, 

And  held  a  shrine,  around  which  tapers  burned, 
With  picture  or  with  statue  or  with  bust. 
All  copied  from  the  same  fair  form  of  dust : 

A  woman  very  young  and  very  fair ; 

Beloved  by  bounteous  life  and  joy  and  youth, 
And  loving  these  sweet  lovers,  so  that  care 

And  age  and  de^th  seemed  not  for  her  in  sooth 
Alike  as  stars,  all  beautiful  and  bright, 
These  shapes  lit  up  that  mausole'an  night. 

At  length  I  heard  a  murmur  as  of  lips, 

And  reached  an  open  oratory  hung 
With  heaviest  blackness  of  the  whole  eclipse ; 

Beneath  the  dome  a  fuming  censer  swung; 
And  one  lay  there  upon  a  low  white  bed, 
With  tapers  burning  at  the  foot  and  head  : 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  37 

The  Lady  of  the  images  :  supine, 
J     Eji^thstill,  lifesweet,^)\vith  folded  pahns  she  lay  : 
And  kneeling  there  as  at  a  sacred  shrine 

A  young  man  wan  and  worn  who  seemed  to  pray  : 
A  crucifix  of  dim  and  ghostly  white 
Surmounted  the  large  altar  left  in  night :  — 

The  chambers  of  the  mansion  of  my  heart, 
In  every  one  whereof  thine  image  dwells, 
Are  black  with  grief  eternal  for  thy  sake. 

The  inmost  oratory  of  my  soul,  ./^duxcx 

Wherein  thou  ever  dwellest  quick  or  jiead,  v«  »^-  ''..j. 

Is  black  with  grief  eternal  for  thy  sake.  ^ 

I  kneel  beside  thee  and  I  clasp  the  cross. 
With  eyes  forever  fixed  upon  that  face. 
So  beautiful  and  dreadful  in  its  calm. 

I  kneel  here  patient  as  thou  liest  there ; 
As  patient  as  a  statue  carved  in  stone, 
Of  adoration  and  eternal  grief. 


38  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

While  thou  dost  not  awake  I  cannot  move ; 
And  something  tells  me  thou  wilt  never  wake, 
And  I  alive  feel  turning  into  stone. 

Most  beautiful  were  Dea^h  to  end  my  grief, 
Most  hateful  to  destroy  the  sight  of  thee, 
Dear  vision  better  than  all  death  or  life. 

But  I  renounce  all  choice  of  life  or  death. 
For  either  shall  be  ever  at  thy  side, 
And  thus  in  bliss  or  woe  be  ever  well. — 

He  murmured  thus  and  thus  in  monotone, 
Intent  upon  that  uncorrupted  face, 

Entranced  except  his  moving  lips  alone  : 

I  glided  with  hushed  footsteps  from  the  place. 

This  was  the  festival  that  filled  with  light 

That  palace  in  the  City  of  the  Night. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  39 


XT 


WHAT  men  are  they  who  haunt  these  fatal  glooms, 
And  fill  their  living  mouths  with  dust  of  deith, 
And  make  their  habitations  in  the  tombs, 

And  breathe  eternal  sighs  with  mortal  breath, 
And  pierce  life's  pleasant  veil  of  various  error 

To  reach  that  void  of  darkness  and  old  terror  ,         -  /  ' 

^ >~ ^ ■ — ^- — , — , —  J      ^-  -^^  -t-' 

Wherein  expire  the  lamps  of  hope  and  faith  ?       /'^^        J, 

f 
They  have  much  wisdom  yet  they  are  not  wise, 

They  have  much  goodness  yet  they  do  not  well, 
(The  fools  we  knovv  have  their  own   Paradise, 

The  wicked  also  have  their  proper  Hell) ; 
They  have  much  strength  but  Sitiit  their  doom  is  stronger, 
Much  patience  but  their  time  endureth  longer, 

Much  valour  but  life  mocks  it  with  some  spell. 

They  are  most  rational  and  yet  insane  : 

An  outward  madness  not  to  be  controlled  ; 


IV^uzb  ±as  lii.'  loomsr.  inn  :sirtgrf  wan  joaxl  xoiii. 


ESSE:  rgtisng:  :n 


■l\-Kt  ;SaWt  -HEe  ;SXG9I 


il3ui:£om±r  renowttSi: 


-Al    l>«Mnvi  of    iifp  :  TJS:  JiiSSt  anr  tllQSt  .315:  iirOtttSSi      " 


t 


ti 


Tkt  City  of  nr"t!fu:  i\tgkt 


XII 


OUR  isolated  units  could  b«  brought  - 

To  act  together  for  some  common  end  " 
For  one  by  one.  each  silent  with  his  thought. 

I  marked  a  long  loose  line  approach  and  wenc 
Athwart  the  great  cathedral  s  clot5t«red  square. 
And  slowly  vanish  from  the  raoonlit  air.  -' 

^    i-  > 

Then  I  would  follow  in  among  the  las- 

.\nd  in  the  porch  a  shrouded  Agure  stood. 
Who  challenged  eac^i  one  pausing  ere  he  passed. 

With  deep  eyes  burning  through  a  blank  white  hood 
Whence  come  you  in  the  world  of  life  and  light 
To  this  our  City  of  Tremendous  Xight  ?  — 


From  plead 
Fqrjome  - 
Who  toil 


ng  in  a  senate  of  ndi  lord 

r  to  our  cointlesi  -i  jraes 
.  Arith  scarce  a  human  right : 


J  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 


42  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

From  wandering  throuc^h  many  a  solemn  scene 

Of  opium  visions,  with  a  heart  serene 

And  intellect  miraculously  bright : 

I  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

From  making  hundreds  laugh  and  roar  with  glee 
By  my  transcendent  feats  of  mimicry, 
And  humour  wanton  as  an  elfish  sprite  : 
I  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

From  prayer  and  fasting  in  a  lonely  cell, 
Which  brought  an  ecstasy  ineffable 
Of  love  and  adoration  and  delight : 
I  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

From  ruling  on  a  splendid  kingly  throne 
A  nation  which  beneath  my  rule  has  grown 
Year  after  year  in  wealth  and  arts  and  might : 
I  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

From  preaching  to  an  audience  fired  with  faith 
The  Lamb  who  died  to  save  our  souls  from  death. 


The  City  nf  Dreadful  Nij^hi.  43 

Whose  blood  hath  washed  our  scarlet  sins  wool-white :  , 
f  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

(' 
From  drinking  fiery  poison  in  a  den 
Crowded  with  tawdry  girls  and  squalid  men. 
Who  hoarsely  laugh  and  curse  and  brawl  and  fight  : 
[  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

From  picturing  with  all  beauty  and  all  grace 
First  Eden  and  the  parents  of  our  race, 
A  luminous  rapture  unto  all  men's  sight : 
I  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

From  writing  a  great  work  with  patient  plan 
To  justify  the  ways  of  God  to  man, 
And  show  hoW  ill  must  fade  and  perish  quite  : 
1  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 

From  desperate  fighting  with  a  little  band 
Against  the  powerful  tyrants  of  our  land. 
Tojree  our  brethren  in  their  own  despite : 
I  wake  from  daydreams  to  this  real  night. 


44  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

Thus,  challenged  by  that  warder  sad  and  stern, 
Each  one  responded  with  his  countersign, 

Then  entered  the  cathedral ;  and  in  turn 
T  entered  also,  having  given  mine ; 

But  lingered  near  until  I  heard  no  more. 

And  marked  the  closing  of  the  massive  door. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  45 


XIII 


OF  all  things  human  which  are  strange  and  wild 
This  is  perchance  the  wildest  and  most  strange,    ^     , 
And  showeth  man  most  utterly  beguiled, 

To  those  who  haunt  that  sunless  City's  range ; 
That  he  bemgans  himself  for  aye,  repeating 
How  Ty3flf€  is  d^^ly  swift,  how  life  is  fleeting, 
How  naught  is  constant  on  the  earth  but  change. 

The  hours  are  heavy  on  him  and  the  days : 

The  burden  of  the  months  he  scarce  can  bear ; 

And  often  in  his  secret  soul  he  prays 

To  sleep  through  barren  periods  unaware. 

Arousing  at  some  Iqnged-for  date  of  pleasure : 

Which  having  passed  and  yielded  him  small  treasure, 
He  would  outsleep  another  term  of  care. 

Yet  in  his  marvellous  fapcy  he  must  make 
Quick  wings  for  Tifne,  and  see  it  fly  from  us ; 


46  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

This  Tinj€  which  crawleth  like  a  monstrous  snake, 
Wotinded  and  slow  and  very  venomous  ; 

Which  creeps  blindwormlike  round  the  earth  and  ocean, 

Distilling  poison  at  each  painful  motion. 
And  seems  condemned  to  circle  ever  thus. 

And  since  he  cannot  spend  and  use  aright 

The  little  time  here  given  him  in  trust, 
But  wasteth  it  in  weary  undelight 

Of  foolish  toil  and  trouble,  strife  and  lust. 
He  naturally  claimeth  to  inherit  1'^/-'"'^  i 

The  everlasting  Future,  that  his  merit  '       {■ 

May  have  fuU^cope;  as  surely  is  most  just. 

O  length  of  the  intolerable  hc^urs, 

O  nights  that  are  as  aeons  of  slow  pain, 
O  Tifne,  too  ample  for  our  vital  powers, 

O  Life,  whose  woeful  vanities  remain 
Immutable  for  all  of  all  our  legions 
Through  all  the  centuries  and  in  all  the  regions. 

Not  of  your  speed  and  variance  we  complain. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  47 

We  do  not  ask  a  longer  term  of  strife, 
Weakness  and  weariness  and  nameless  woes ; 

We  do  not  claim  renewed  and  endless  life 

When  this  which  is  our  torment  here  shall  close. 

An  everlasting  conscious  inanition  ! 

We  yeaxn  for  speedy  d^th  in  full  fruition, 
Dateless  oblivion  and  divine  repose. 


VV^^ 


S^^i*^- 


J^ 


LC 


U-^    *" 


Jj.^i'-'^ 


48  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


XIV 


LARGE  glooms  were  gathered  in  the  mighty  fane. 
With  tinted  moongleams  slanting  here  and  there; 
And  all  was  hush :   no  swelling  organ-strain, 

No  chant,  no  voice  or  murmuring  of  prayer; 
No  priests  came  forth,  no  tinkling  censers  fumed,»_»_ 
And  the  high  altar  space  was  unillumed. 

Around  the  pillars  and  against  the  walls 

Leaned  men  and  shadows ;  others  seemed  to  brood 

Bent  or  recumbent  in  secluded  stalls. 

Perchance  they  were  not  a  great  multitude 

Save  in  that  city  of  so  lonely  streets 

Where  one  may  count  up  every  face  he  meets. 

All  patiently  awaited  the  event 

Without  a  stir  or  sound,  as  if  no  less 


1 


Self^occupied,  doomstricken,  while  attent. 
And  then  we  heard  a  voice  of  solemn  stress 


The  City  of  Dreadfid  Night.  49 

From  the  dark  pulpit,  and  our  gaze  there  met 
Two  eyes  which  burned  as  never  eyes  burned  yet : 

Two  steadfast  and  intolerable  eyes 

Burning  beneath  a  broad  and  rugged  brow  ; 

The  head  behind  it  of  enormous  size. 

And  as  black  fir-groves  in  a  large  wind  bow, 

Our  rooted  congregation,  gloom-arrayed. 

By  that  great  sad  voice  deep  and  full  were  swayed :  — 

O  melancholy  Brothers,  dark,  dark,  dark  ! 
O  battling  in  black  floods  without  an  ark  ! 

O  spectral  wanderers  of  unholy  Night ! 
My  soul  hath  bled  for  you  these  sunless  jji^ars. 
With  bitter  blood-drops  running  down  like  tears  : 

Oh,  dark,  dark,  dark,  withdrawn  from  joy  and  light ! 

My  heart  is  sick  with  anguish  for  your  bale ; 
Your  woe  hath  been  my  anguish  ;  yea,  I  quail 

And  perish  in  your  perishing  unblest. 
And  I  have  searched  the  highths  and  depths,  the  scope 
Of  all  our  universe,  with  desperate  hope 

To  find  some  solace  for  your  wild  unrest. 


50  I'he  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

And  now  at  last  authentic  word  I  bring, 
Witnessed  by  every  d^d  and  living  thing  ; 
Good  tidings  of  great  joy  for  you,  for  all : 
/    There  is  no  God  ;  no  FienH^vTlTii  names  divine 
Made  us  and  tortures  us  ;   if  we  must  pine, 
It  is  to  satiate  no  Being's  gall. 


It  was  the  dark  delusion  of  a  dream, 
That  living  Person  conscious  and  supreme, 

Whom  we  must  curse  for  cursing  us  with  life 
Whom  we  must  curse  because  the  life  He  gave 
Could  not  be  buried  in  the  quiet  grave, 

Could  not  be  killed  by  poison  or  by  knife. 


This  little  life  is  all  we  must  endure, 
The  grave's  most  holy  peace  is  ever  sure,' 

We  fall  asleep  and  never  wake  again  ; 
Nothing  is  of  us  but  the  mouldering  flesh. 
Whose  elements  dissolve  and  merge  afresh 

In  earth,  air,  water,  plants,  and  other  men.  w^^A 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  5 1 

We  finish  thus  ;  and  all  our  wretched  race 
Shall  finish  with  its  cycle,  and  give  plaice 

To  other  beings,  with  their  own  time-doom  : 
Infinite  aeons  ere  our  kind  began  ; 
Infinite  aeons  after  the  last  man 

Has  joined  the  mammoth  in  earth's  tomb  and  womb. 


We  bow  down  to  the  universal  laws, 
Which  never  had  for  man  a  special  clause 

Of  cruelty  or  kindness,  love  or  hate  : 
If  toads  and  vultures  are  obscene  to  sight. 
If  tigers  burn  with  beauty  and  with  might, 

Is  it  by  favour  or  by  wrath  of  Fate  ? 


All  substance  lives  and  struggles  evermore 
Through  countless  shapes  continually  at  war, 

By  Cflun tie.'is  interactions  interknit : 
If  one  is  born  a  certain  day  on  earth. 
All  titees  and  forces  tended  to  that  birth, 

Not  all  the  world  could  change  or  hinder  it. 


5  2  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

I  find  no  hint  throughout  the  Universe 
Of  good  or  ill,  of  blessing  or  of  curse  ; 

I  find  alone  Necessity  Supreme ; 
With  infinite  Mystery,  abysmal,  dark, 
Unlighted  ever  by  the  faintest  spark 

For  us  the  flitting  shadows  of  a  dream. 


O  Brothers  of  s^d  lives  !  they  are  so  brief  ; 
A  few  short  years  must  bring  us  all  relief : 

Can  we  not  bear  these  years  of  labouring  breath  ? 
But  if  you  would  not  this  poor  life  fulfil, 
Lo,  you  are  free  to  end  it  when  you  will, 

Without  the  fear  of  waking  after  death. — 

The  organ-like  vibrations  of  his  voice 

Thrilled  through  the  vaulted  aisles  and  died  away ; 
The  yearning  of  the  tones  which  bade  rejoice 

Was  sad  and  tender  as  a  requiem  lay : 
Our  shadowy  congregation  rested  still 
As  brooding  on  that  "  End  it  when  you  will." 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  53 


XV 


WHEREVER  men  are  gathered,  all  the  air 
Is  charged  with  human  feeUng,  human  thought : 
Each  shout  and  cry  and  laugh,  each  curse  and  prayer, 

Are  into  its  vibrations  surely  wrought ; 
Unspoken  passion,  wordless  meditation, 
Are  breathed  into  it  with  our  respiration  ; 
It  is  with  our  life  fraught  and  overfraught. 

So  that  no  man  there  breathes  earth's  simple  breath, 

As  if  alone  on  mountains  or  wide  seas ; 
But  nourishes  warm  life  or  hastens  death 

With  joys  and  sorrows,  health  and  foul  disease, 
Wisdom  and  folly,  good  and  evil  labours, 
Incessant  of  his  multitudinous  neighbours  ; 

He  in  his  turn  affecting  all  of  these. 

That  City's  atmosphere  is  dark  and  dense. 
Although  not  many  exiles  wander  there, 


54  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

With  many  a  potent  evil  influence, 

Each  adding  poison  to  the  poisoned  air  ; 
Infections  of  unutterable  sadness, 
Infections  of  incalculable  madness, 
Infections  of  incurable  despair. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  55 


XVI 

OUR  shadowy  congregation  rested  still, 
As  musing  on  that  message  we  had  heard 
And  brooding  on  that  "  End  it  when  you  will ;  " 

Perchance  awaiting  yet  some  other  word  ; 
When  keen  as  lightning  through  a  muffled  sky 
Sprang  forth  a  shrill  and  lamentable  cry :  — 

The  man  speaks  sooth,  alas !  the  man  speaks  sooth  : 
We  have  no  personal  life  beyond  the  grave ; 

There  is  no  God  ;   Fate  knows  nor  wrath  nor  ruth : 
Can  I  find  here  the  comfort  which  I  crave  ? 

In  all  eternity  I  had  one  chance, 

One  few  years'  term  of  gracious  human  life  : 
The  splendours  of  the  intellect's  advance. 

The  sweetness  of  the  home  with  babes  and  wife ; 

■■        '  "        '  ■■"■II  III. ,  mm-mamtt0 

The  social  pleasures  with  their  genial  wit ; 
The  fascination  of  the  worlds  of  art, 


56  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

The  glories  of  the  worlds  of  nature,  lit 
By  large  imagination's  glowing  heart ; 

The  rapture  of  mere  being,  full  of  health  ; 

The  careless  childhood  and  the  ardent  youth, 
The  strenuous  manhood  winning  various  wealth, 

The  reverend  age  serene  with  life's  long  truth  : 

All  the  sublime  prerogatives  of  Man  ; 

The  storied  memories  of  the  times  of  old, 
The  patient  tracking  of  the  world's  gi-eat  plan 

Through  sequences  and  changes  myriadfold. 

This  chance  was  never  offered  me  before  ; 

For  me  the  infinite  Past  is  blank  and  dumb  : 
This  chance  recurreth  never,  nevermore  ; 

Blank,  blank  for  me  the  infinite  To-come. 

And  this  sole  chance  was  frustrate  from  my  birth, 
A  mockery,  a  delusion  ;  and  my  breath 

Of  noble  human  life  upon  this  earth 

So  racks  me  that  I  sigh  for  senseless  death. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  57 

My  wine  of  life  is  poison  mixed  with  gall, 
My  noonday  passes  in  a  nightmare  dream, 

T  worse  than  lose  the  years  which  are  my  all : 
What  can  console  me  for  the  loss  supreme  ? 

Speak  not  of  comfort  where  no  comfort  is, 

Speak  not  at  all  :  can  words  make  foul  things  fair? 

Our  life  's  a  cheat,  our  death  a  black  abyss  : 
Hush  and  be  mute  envisaging  despair.  — 

This  vehement  voice  came  from  the  northern  aisle 
Rapid  and  shrill  to  its  abrupt  harsh  close  ; 

And  none  gave  answer  for  a  certain  while, 

For  words  must  shrink  from  these  most  wordless  woes  ; 

At  last  the  pulpit  speaker  simply  said, 

With  humid  eyes  and  thoughtful  drooping  head  :  — 

My  Brother,  my  poor  Brothers,  it  is  thus  ; 
This  life  itself  holds  nothing  good  for  us, 

But  it  ends  soon  And  nevermore  can  be ; 
And  we  knew  nothing  of  it  ere  our  birth, 
And  shall  know  nothing  when  consigned  to  earth  : 

I  ponder  these  thoughts  and  they  comfort  me. 


..^s 


58  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

t'' 


XVII 

HOW  the  moon  triumphs  through  the  endless  nights  ! 
How  the  stars  throb  and  gHtter  as  they  wheel 
Their  thick  processions  of  super nalj^ghts  -7  ^q 

Around  the  blue  vault  obdurate  as  steel  ! 
And  men  regard  with  passionate  awe  and  yearning 
The  mighty  marching  and  the  golden  burning, 
And  think  the  heavens  respond  to  what  they  feel. 

Boats  gliding  like  dark  shadows  of  a  dream, 

Are  glorified  from  vision  as  they  pass 
The  quivering  moonbridge  on  the  deep  black  stream  ; 

Cold  windows  kindle  their  dead  glooms  of  glass 
To  restless  crystals ;  cornice,  dome,  and  column 
Emerge  from  chaos  in  the  splendour  solemn  ; 

Like  faery  lakes  gleam  lawns  of  -dewT'grass. 

With  such  a  living  light  these  dead  eyes  shine, 
These  eves  of  sightless  heaven,  that  as  we  graze 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  59 

We  read  a  pity,  tremulous,  divine, 

Or  cold  majestic  scorn  in  their  pure  rays  : 

Fond  man  I  they  are  not  haughty,  are  not  tender ; 

There  is  no  heart  or  mind  in  all  their  splendour, 

They  thread  mere  puppets  all  their  marvellous  maze. 

If  we  could  near  them  with  the  flight  unflown, 
We  should  but  find  them  worlds  as  sad  as  this. 

Or  suns  all  self-consuming  like  our  own 
Enringed  by  planet  worlds  as  much  amiss  : 

They  wax  and  wane  through  fusion  and  confusion  : 

The  spheres  eternal  are  a  grand  illusion, 
The  empyrean  is  a  void  abyss. 


6o  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


XVIII 


T  wandered  in  a  suburb  of  the  north, 
And  reached  a  spot  whence  three  close  lanes  led  down, 
Beneath  thick  trees  and  hedgerows  winding  forth 

Like  deep  brook  channels,  deep  and  dark  and  lown  : 
The  air  above  was  wan  with  misty  light, 
The  dull  grey  south  showed  one  vague  blur  of  white. 

I  took  the  left-hand  lane  and  slowly  trod 

Its  earthen  footpath,  brushing  as  I  went 
The  humid  leafage ;  and  my  feet  were  shod 

With  heavy  languor,  and  my  frame  downbent, 
With  infinite  sleepless  weariness  outworn, 
So  many  nights  I  thus  had  paced  forlorn. 

After  a  hundred  steps  I  grew  aware 

Of  something  crawling  in  the  lane  below ; 

It  seemed  a  wounded  creature  prostrate  there 
That  sobbed  with  pangs  in  making  progress  slow, 

The  hind  limbs  stretched  to  push,  the  fore  limbs  then 

To  drag  ;  for  it  would  (lie  in  its  own  den. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  6i 

But  coming  level  with  it  I  discerned 
That  it  had  been  a  man  ;  for  at  my  tread 

It  stopped  in  its  sore  travail  and  half-turned, 
Leaning  upon  its  right,  and  raised  its  head, 

And  with  the  left  hand  twitched  back  as  in  ire 

Long  grey  unreverend  locks  befouled  with  mire. 

A  haggard  filthy  face  with  bloodshot  eyes. 

An  infamy  for  manhood  to  behold. 
He  gasped  all  trembling,  What,  you  want  my  prize  ? 

You  leave,  to  rob  me,  wine  and  lust  and  gold 
And  all  that  men  go  mad  upon,  since  you 
Have  traced  my  sacred  secret  of  the  clue .' 

You  think  that  I  am  weak  and  must  submit ; 

Yet  I  but  scratch  you  with  this  poisoned  blade, 
And  you  are 'ds^d  as  if  I  clove  with  it 

That  false  fierce  greedy  heart.     Betrayed  !  betrayed  ! 
I  fling  this  phial  if  you  seek  to  pass, 
And  you  are  forthwith  shrivelled  up  like  grass. 

And  then  with  sudden  change,  Take  thought !  take  thought ! 
Have  pity  on  me  !  it  is  mine  alone. 


If  yoE  couic  find,  i:  would  arail  voc  Taxj^rrr: . 

5»eec  eiseviie^  nr  die  paaswar  of  ynur  otwe  : 
Fnr  TOir  a:  mara!!  or  ammo-^  race 
Tat  {tiStaranc  -cf  anrojer  cat  reiraDe  r 

Ebf  Tont  'bic  tnov  irj  airorr  aiir  xnT 

Tw:  ^aneF  drnerxje  et  Tr.-iuaer  froir  "zhi?  iHiu 

SuAc  , 

E  .canun:  i3m«Pt  Ijiic  utna  c  ;.: 

Siir  C  arc  ir  dte  ^phtt  'irar  a:  ias: 
Ti'  tnnt  Af  iicai|njMt  iirifem  ^^aOdfen  tibrsaii 

WSUkft.  rtwimrfft  ainr  ^rssslSI  WQC&  BIT  p9SL 

k£  piix  b}£:  ^  ]paiir  ':^«tl  vanr.    JLaS  I  sn&. 
I  wdl  rainne  ££  snni  k  jf^ix  kave  4aiU 

l£aifiec&  ti&B£  iiostr  tbffead  of  s«U. 


It  fieaAs  Be  baejk: 
nBhsMKanonv 
Am!  efavsnglk  the  deserts  vUdt  l»i«  cfee  «»  «»dL 


The  Ctty  of  I>readful  Ntghi. 

And  tnrou^  \-as:  wastes  of  horroT-hairattd  time 
To  Eden  innocencs  in  Eden's  ciime  : 

And  I  become  a  nursiing  soft  and  pure. 
An  infant  cradied  on  its  Blather's  knee. 

Withoui  a  pas:  ^aed  and  secure  ; 

Wfaict  if  it  -.  lisome  present  Me. 

Would  phmge  its  face  into  trie  pillowing  iireast 

And  scream  abiunrence  iiard  to  iuL  to  test. 

He  turned  to  grope  :  and  3  retrring  fanished 
Tiiir  sirreds  of  gT>55anieT  from  off  mv  face. 

And  mused.  His  lite  would  grow,  tite  g^rm  uncrusheC 
3e  siu)uid  to  antenatal  nigitt  retnact 

And  iiide  iiis  elemeng  jf.  tiia:t  iargt:  womi 

Beyond  tiie  reach  of  maxj-evoiving  Imnrr. 

And  even  tiuis.  wiia:  wearv  war  were  tiiuiirc- 
Tc  seek  obiiviar  tirrougfc  tte  far-off  gatt 

Of  birtii.  wtten  that  of  dqttii  is  jUasst  a:  ^anr^  ; 
Tax  lis  is  taw.  n  iaw  tbere  i»e  in  Paee 

What  ne^^sT  h^  ijeen.  vet  mar  liave  is  wiier  . 

The  tiung  which  iia?  been,  never  s  agam 


64  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


XIX 

THE  mighty  river  flowing  dark  and  deep,  i^^s-^W--^      0\ 

With  ebb  and  flood  from  the  rem(aie_S£a-tides  ' 

Vague-sounding  through  the  City's  sleepless  sleep. 

Is  named  the  River  of  the  Suicides ; 
For  night  by  night  some  lorn  wretch  overweary, 
And  shuddering  from  the  future  yet  more  dreary, 
Within  its  cold  secure  oblivion  hides. 

One  plunges  from  a  bridge's  parapet, 

As  by  some  blind  and  sudden  frenzy  hurled  ; 
Another  wades  in  slow  with  purpose  set 

Until  the  waters  are  above  him  furled  ; 
Another  in  a  boat  with  dreamlike  motion 
Glides  drifting  down  into  the  desertocgaaa, 

To  starve  or  sink  from  out  the  desert  world. 

They  perish  from  their  suffering  surely  thus. 
For  none  beholding  them  attempts  to  save, 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  65 

The  while  each  thinks  how  soon,  solicitous, 

He  may  seek  refuge  in  the  self-same  wave  ; 
Some  h^r  when  tired  of  ever-vain  endurance 
Impafience  will  forerun  the  sweet  assurance 
Of  perfect  peace  eventual  in  the  grave. 

When  this  poor  tragic-farce  has  palled  us  long, 
Why  actors  and  spectators  do  we  stay  ?  — 
^-^o  fill  our  so-short  roles  out  right  or  wrong  ; 

-  -  To  see  what  shifts  are  yet  in  the  dull  play 

For  our  illusion  ;  to  refrain  from  grieving 

Dear  foolish  friends  by  our  untimely  leaving  : 
But  those  asleep  at  home,  how  blest  are  they  ! 

Yet  it  is  but  for  one  night  after  all : 

What  matters  one  brief  night  of  dreary  pain  ? 

When  after  it  the  weary  eyelids  fall 

Upon  the  weary  eyes  and  wasted  brain  ; 

And  all  sad  scenes  and  thoughts  and  feelings  vanish 

In  that  sweet  sleep  no  power  can  ever  banish. 
That  one  best  sleep  which  never  wakes  again. 


k 


,7 


66  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 


XX 


I  sat  me  weary  on  a  pillar's  base, 
And  leaned  against  the  shaft ;  for  broad  moonlight 
O'erflowed  the  peacefulness  of  cloistered  space, 

A  shore  of  shadow  slanting  from  the  right  : 
The  great  cathedral's  western  front  stood  there, 
A  wave-worn  rock  in  that  calm  sea  of   air. 

Before  it,  opposite  my  place  of  rest, 

Two  figures  faced  each  other,  large,  austere  ; '       Ji" 
A  couchant  sphinx  in  shadow  to  the   breast. 

An  angel  standing  in  the  moonlight  clear  ; 
So  mighty  by  magnificence  of  form, 
They  were  not  dwarfed  beneath  that  mass  enorm. 

Upon  the  cross-hilt  of  a  naked  sword 

The  angel's  hands,  as  prompt  to  smite,  were  held  ; 
His  vigilant,  intense  regard  was  poured 

Upon  the  creature  placidly   unquelled, 


\}-' 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  6  7 

Whose  front  was  set  at  level  gaze  which  took 
No  heed  of  aught,  a  solemn  trance-like  look. 

And  as  I  pondered  these  opposed  shapes 
My  eyelids  sank  in  stupor,  that  dull  swoon 

Which  drugs  and  with  a  leaden  mantle  drapes 
The  outworn  to  worse  weariness.     But  soon 

A  sharp  and  clashing  noise  the  stillness  broke, 

And  from  the  evil  lethargy  I  woke. 

The  angel's  wings  had  fallen,  stone  on  stone, 

And  lay  there  shattered  ;  hence  the  sudden  sound  : 

A  warrior  leaning  on  his  sword  alone 

Now  watched  the  sphinx  with  that  regard  profound  ; 

The  sphinx  unchanged  looked  forthright,  as  aware 

Of  nothing  in  the  vast  abyss  of  air. 

Again  I  sank  in  that  repose  unsweet. 

Again  a  clashing  noise  my  slumber  rent ; 
The  warrior's  sword  lay  broken  at  his  feet : 

An  unarmed  man  with  raised  hands  impotent 
Now  stood  before  the  sphinx,  which  ever  kept 
Such  mien  as  if  with  open  eyes  it  slept. 


68  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

My  eyelids  sank  in  spite  of  wonder  grown  ; 

A  louder  crash  upstartled  me  in  dread  : 
The  man  had  fallen  forward,  stone  on  stone, 

And  lay  there  shattered,  with  his  trunkless  head 
Between  the  monster's  large  quiescent  paws, 
Beneath  its  grand  front  changeless  as  life's  laws. 

The  moon  had  circled  westward  full  and  bright, 
And  made  the  temple-front  a  mystic  dream, 

And  bathed  the  whole  enclosure  with  its  light, 
The  sworded  angel's  wrecks,  the  sphinx  supreme  : 

I  pondered  long  that  cold  majestic  face 

Whose  vision  seemed  of  infinite  void  space. 


21ie  City  sf  Dreadful  Night.  69 


XXI 

A  NEAR  the  center  of  that  northern  crest 
Stands  out  a  level  upland  bleak  and  bare, 
From  which  the  city  east  and  south  and  west 

Sinks  gently  in  long  waves;  and  throned  there 
An  Image  sits,  stupendous,  superhuman. 
The  bronze  colossus  of  a  winged  Woman, 
Upon  a  graded  granite  base  foursquare. 

Low-seated  she  leans  forward  massively, 

With  cheek  on  clenched  left  hand,  the  forearm's  might 
Erect,  its  elbow  on  her  rounded  knee  ; 

Across  a  clasped  book  in  her  lap  the  right 
Upholds  a  pair  of  compasses  ;  she  gazes 
With  full  set  eyes,  but  wandering  in  thick  mazes 

Of  sombre  thought  beholds  no  outward  sight. 


70  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

Words  cannot  picture  her ;  but  all  men  know 
That  solemn  sketch  the  pure  sad  artist  wrought 

Three  centuries  and  threescore  v^ars  ago, 
With  phantasies  of  his  peculiar  thought : 

The  instruments  of  carpentry  and  science 

Scattered  about  her  feet,  in  strange  alliance 

With  the  keen  wolf-hound  sleeping  undistraught ; 

Scales,  hour-glass,  bell,  and  magic-square  above  ; 

The  grave  and  solid  infant  perched  beside, 
With  open  winglets  that  might  bear  a  dove, 

Intent  upon  its  tablets,  heavy-eyed  ; 
Her  folded  wings  as  of  a  mighty  eagle, 
But  all  too  impotent  to  lift  the  regal 

Robustness  of  her  earth-born  strength  and  pride ; 

And  with  those  wings,  and  that  light  wreath  which  seems 
To  mock  her  grand  head  and  the  knotted  frown 

Of  forehead  charged  with  baleful  thoughts  and  dreams, 
The  household  bunch  of  keys,  the  housewife's  gown 

Voluminous,  indented,  and  yet  rigid 

As  if  a  shell  of  burnished  metal  frigid. 

The  feet  thick-shod  to  tread  all  weakness  down : 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.  7 1 

The  comet  hanging  o'er  the  waste  dark  seas, 

The  massy  rainbow  curved  in  front  of  it 
Beyond  the  village  with  the  masts  and  trees ; 

The  snaky  imp,  dog-headed,  from  the  Pit, 
Bearing  upon  its  batlike  leathern  pinions 
Her  name  unfolded  in  the  sun's  dominions, 

The  "  Melencolia"  that  transcends  all  wit. 

Thus  has  the  artist  copied  her,  and  thus 
Surrounded  to  expound  her  form  sublime, 

Her  fate  heroic  and  calamitous ; 

Fronting  the  dreadful  mysteries  of  Time, 

Unvanquished  in  defeat  and  desolation, 

Undaunted  in  the  hopeless  conflagration 
Of  the  day  setting  on  her  bafifled  prime. 

Baffled  and  beaten  back  she  works  on  still. 
Weary  and  sick  of  soul  she  works  the  more, 

Sustained  by  her  indomitable  will : 

The  hands  shall  fashion  and  the  brain  shall  pore, 

Andvall  her  sorrow  shall  be  turned  to  labour, 

Till  Death  the  friend-foe  piercing  with  his  sabre 
That  mighty  heart  of  hearts  ends  bitter  war. 


72  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night. 

But  as  if  blacker  night  could  dawn  on  night, 

With  tenfold  gloom  on  moonless  night  unstarred, 

A  sense  more  tragic  than  defeat  and  blight, 
More  desperate  than  strife  with  hope  debarred, 

More  fatal  than  the  adamantine  Never 

Encompassing  her  passionate  endeavour, 
Dawns  glooming  in  her  tenebrous  regard  : 

The  sense  that  every  struggle  brings  defeat 
Because  Fate  holds  no  prize  to  crown  success ; 

That  all  the  oracles  are  dumb  or  cheat 
Because  they  have  no  secret  to  express ; 

That  none  can  pierce  the  vast  black  veil  uncertain 

Because  there  is  no  light  beyond  the  curtain  ; 
That  all  is  vanity  and  nothingness. 

Titanic  from  her  high  throne  in  the  north. 
That  City's  sombre  Patroness  and  Queen, 

In  bronze  sublimity  she  gazes  forth 
Over  her  Capital  of  teen  and  threne, 

Over  the  river  with  its  isles  and  bridges, 

The  marsh  and  moorland,  to  the  stern  rock-ridges, 
Confronting  them  with  a  coeval  mien. 


The  City  of  Dreadful  Nighf.  73 

The  moving  moon  and  stars  from  east  to  west         '  ■^ 

Circle  before  her  in  the  sea  of  air ; 
Shadows  and  gleams  glide  round  her  solemn  rest. 

Her  subjects  often  gaze  up  to  her  there  : 
The  strong  to  drink  new  strength  of  iron  endurance, 
The.  weak  new  terrors;  all,  renewed  assurance 

And  confirmation  of  the  old  despair. 


Ji^ 


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^  Y   (K^l^""    Ji  "^^ 


v/^l 

k'- 

APPENDIX 


Note.  The  impression  made  by  The  City  of  Dreadful 
Night  is  deepened  by  the  testimony  of  the  two  poems 
appended :  To  Our  Ladies  of  Death  and  Insomnia.  The 
former  was  published  in  1861,  the  latter  in  1882  ;  while  the 
central  and  chief  part  of  the  trilogy  was  written  during  the 
years  1870-74.  Time,  the  friend  of  man  and  forerunner  of 
eternal  life,  was  for  this  conquered  soul  a  cruel  enemy, 
war-lord  of  "  his  days  and  months  and  years." 

In  the  more  youthful  chant  of  desperation,  he  is 
yet  able  to  apotheosize  Death  —  as  in  an  antique  moon- 
myth  —  a  goddess  in  heaven,  in  hell  and  on  earth.  Or 
rather  she  has  the  three-fold  divmity  of  Diana,  whose  gen- 
tle darts  give  sleep;  of  Venus,  the  world's  delight  and 
bane ;  and  of  the  solemn  Proserpine  crowned  with  lethal 
poppies.  In  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night  this  pure  fancy 
appears  to  be  succeeded  by  a  singular  power  of  clothing 
grief —  or  its  recurrent  eidolons  — in  brilliant  allegories. 

At  the  end  of  two  decades  of  endurance,  Thomson's 
verse  became  an  outcry  of  tortured  nerves.  In  the  poem 
Insomnia  we  find  the  author  concerned  with  individual  ex- 
pression rather  than  with  impersonation  or  with  typical  de- 
sign. For  him  "  life  is  one  dark  maze  of  dreams ; "  and 
"  the  sun-hours  ...  the  star-hours,"  are  the  black  or 
lurid  ridges  of  timeless  Malebolge.  The  triune  pathetic 
record  of  the  malady  of  his  spirit  must  win  for  his  mem- 
ory at  once  admiration  and  pity. 


TO  OUR  LADIES  OF  DEATH.^ 
1861. 


'  Tired  with  all  tliese,  for  restful  deatii  I  cry." 

—  Shakespeare  :  Sonnet  1 


WEARY  of  erring  in  this  desert  Life, 
Weary  of  hoping  hopes  for  ever  vain, 
Weary  of  struggling  in  all-sterile  strife. 

Weary  of  thought  which  maketh  nothing  plain, 
I  close  my  eyes  and  calm  my  panting  breath, 
And  pray  to  Thee,  O  ever-quiet  Death  ! 
To  come  and  soothe  away  my  bitter  pain. 

The  strong  shall  strive,  —  may  they  be  victors  crowned ; 

The  wise  still  seek,  —  may  they  at  length  find  Truth  ; 
The  young  still  hope,  —  may  purest  love  be  found 

To  make  their  age  more  glorious  than  their  youth. 
For  me;  my  brain  is  weak,  my  heart  is  cold, 
My  hope  and  faith  long  dead ;  my  life  but  bold 

In  jest  and  laugh  to  parry  hateful  ruth. 


>  The  Three  Ladies,  suggested  l)y  the  sublime  sisterhood  of  Our 
Ladles  of  Sorrow,  in  the  •'  Suspiria  de  Profundis  "  of  De  Quincey. 


78  To  our  Ladies  of  Death. 

Over  me  pass  the  days  and  months  and  years 
Like  squadrons  and  battalions  of  the  foe 

Trampling  with  thoughtless  thrusts  and  alien  jeers 
Over  a  wounded  soldier  lying  low : 

He  grips  his  teeth,  or  flings  them  words  of  scorn 

To  mar  their  triumph  ;  but  the  while,  outworn, 
Inwardly  craves  for  death  to  end  his  woe. 

Thus  I,  in  secret,  call,  O  Death  1  to  Thee. 

Thou  Youngest  of  the  solemn  Sisterhood, 
Thou  Gentlest  of  the  mighty  Sisters  Three 

Whom  I  have  known  so  well  since  first  endued 
By  Love  and  Grief  with  vision  to  discern 
What  spiritual  life  doth  throb  and  burn 

Through  all  our  world,  with  evil  powers  and  good. 

The  Three  whom  I  have  known  so  long,  so  well. 
By  intimate  communion,  face  to  face, 

In  every  mood,  of  Earth,  of  Heaven,  of  Hell, 
In  every  season  and  in  every  place. 

That  joy  of  Life  has  ceased^to  visit  me. 

As  one  estranged  by  powerful  witchery, 
Infatuate  in  a  Siren's  weird  embrace. 

First  Thou,  O  priestess,  prophetess,  and  queen. 
Our  Lady  of  Beatitudes,  first  Thou : 

Of  mighty  stature,  of  seraphic  mien, 

Upon  the  tablet  of  whose  broad  white  brow 

Unvanquishable  Truth  is  written  clear, 

The  secret  of  the  mystery  of  our  sphere, 
The  regnant  word  of  the  Eternal  Now. 


To  our  Ladies  of  Death.  79 

Thou  standest  garmented  in  purest  white  ; 

But  from  thy  shoulders  wings  of  power  half-spread 
Invest  thy  form  with  such  miraculous  light 

As  dawn  may  clothe  the  earth  with  :  and,  instead 
Of  any  jewel-kindled  golden  crown, 
The  glory  of  thy  long  hair  flowing  down 

Is  dazzling  noonday  sunshine  round  thy  head. 

Upon  a  sword  thy  left  hand  resteth  calm, 

A  naked  sword,  two-edged  and  long  and  straight ; 

A  branch  of  olive  with  a  branch  of  palm 
Thy  right  hand  proffereth  to  hostile  Fate. 

The  shining  plumes  that  clothe  thy  feet  are  bound 

By  knotted  strings,  as  if  to  tread  the  ground 
With  weary  steps  when  thou  wouldst  soar  elate. 

Twin  heavens  uplifted  to  the  heavens,  thine  eyes 

Are  solemn  with  unutterable  thought 
And  love  and  aspiration ;  yet  there  lies 

Within  their  light  eternal  sadness,  wrought 
By  hope  deferred  and  baffled  tenderness  : 
Of  all  the  souls  whom  thou  dost  love  and  bless, 

How  few  revere  and  love  thee  as  they  ought ! 

Thou  leadest  heroes  from  their  warfare  here 
To  nobler  fields  where  grander  crowns  are  won ; 

Thou  leadest  sages  from  this  twilight  sphere 
To  cloudless  heavens  and  an  unsetting  sun ; 

Thou  leadest  saints  into  that  purer  air 

Whose  breath  is  spiritual  life  and  prayer : 
Yet,  lo  1  they  seek  thee  not,  but  fear  and  shun  I 


To  our  Ladies  of  Death. 

Thou  takest  to  thy  most  maternal  breast 

Young  children  from  the  desert  of  this  earth, 

Ere  sin  hath  stained  their  souls,  or  grief  opprest. 
And  bearest  them  unto  an  heavenly  birth. 

To  be  the  Vestals  of  God's  Fane  above : 

And  yet  their- kindred  moan  against  thy  love, 
With  wild  and  selfish  moans  in  bitter  dearth. 

Most  holy  Spirit,  first  Self-conqueror ; 

Thou  Victress  over  Time  and  Destiny 
And  Evil,  in  the  all-deciding  war 

So  fierce,  so  long,  so  dreadful !  —  Would  that  me 
Thou  hadst  upgathered  in  my  life's  pure  morn  I 
Unworthy  then,  less  worthy  now,  forlorn, 

I  dare  not,  Gracious  Mother,  call  on  Thee. 

Next  Thou,  O  sibyl,  sorceress  and  queen, 

Our  Lady  of  Annihilation,  Thou ! 
Of  mighty  stature,  of  demoniac  mien  ; 

Upon  whose  swarthy  face  and  livid  brow 
Are  graven  deeply  anguish,  malice,  scorn, 
Strength  ravaged  by  unrest,  resolve  forlorn 

Of  any  hope,  dazed  pride  that  will  not  bow. 

Thy  form  is  clothed  with  wings  of  iron  gloom ; 

But  round  about  thee,  like  a  chain,  is  rolled. 
Cramping  the  sway  of  every  mighty  plume, 

A  stark  constringent  serpent  fold  on  fold : 
Of  its  two  heads,  one  sting  is  in  thy  brain, 
The  other  in  thy  heart ;  their  venom-pain 

Like  fire  distilling  through  thee  uncontrolled. 


To  our  Ladies  of  Death.  8i 

A  rod  of  serpents  wieldeth  thy  right  hand ; 

Thy  left  a  cup  of  raging  fire,  whose  light 
Burns  lurid  on  thyself  as  thou  dost  stand; 

Thy  lidless  eyes  tenebriously  bright ; 
Thy  wings,  thy  vesture,  thy  dishevelled  hair 
Dark  as  the  Grave;  thou  statue  of  Despair, 

Thou  Night  essential  radiating  night. 

Thus  have  I  seen  thee  in  thine  actual  form ; 

Not  thus  can  see  thee  those  whom  thou  dost  sway. 
Inscrutable  Enchantress  ;  young  and  warm, 

Pard-beautiful  and  brilliant,  ever  gay  ; 
Thy  cup  the  very  Wine  of  Life,  thy  rod 
The  wand  of  more  voluptuous  spells  than  God 

Can  wield  in  Heaven;  thus  charmest  thou  thy  prey. 

The  selfish,  fatuous,  proud,  and  pitiless, 

All  who  have  falsified  life's  royal  trust  ; 
The  strong  whose  strength  hath  basked  in  idleness, 

The  great  heart  given  up  to  worldly  lust. 
The  great  mind  destitute  of  moral  faith  ; 
Thou  scourgest  down  to  Night  and  utter  Death, 

Or  penal  spheres  of  retribution  just. 

O  mighty  Spirit,  fraudful  and  malign, 

Demon  of  madness  and  perversity  ! 
The  evil  passions  which  may  make  me  thine 

Are  not  yet  irrepressible  in  me ; 
And  I  have  pierced  thy  mask  of  riant  youth, 
And  seen  thy  form  in  all  its  hideous  truth  : 

I  will  not.  Dreadful  Mother,  call  on  Thee. 


To  our  Ladies  of  Death. 

Last  Thou,  retired  nun  and  throneless  queen, 

Our  Lady  of  Oblivion,  last  Thou : 
Of  human  stature,  of  abstracted  mien ; 

Upon  whose  pallid  face  and  drooping  brow 
Are  shadowed  melancholy  dreams  of  Doom, 
And  deep  absorption  into  silent  gloom. 

And  weary  bearing  of  the  heavy  Now. 

Thou  art  all  shrouded  in  a  gauzy  veil, 

Sombrous  and  cloudlike ;  all  except  that  face 

Of  subtle  loveliness  though  weirdly  pale. 

Thy  soft,  slow-gliding  footsteps  leave  no  trace. 

And  stir  no  sound.     Thy  drooping  hands  infold 

Their  frail  white  fingers  ;  and,  unconscious,  hold 
A  poppy-wreath,  thine  anodyne  of  grace. 

Thy  hair  is  like  a  twilight  round  thy  head : 

Thine  eyes  are  shadowed  wells,  from  Lethe-stream 

With  drowsy  subterranean  waters  fed  ; 
Obscurely  deep,  without  a  stir  or  gleam  ; 

The  gazer  drinks  in  from  them  with  his  gaze 

An  opiate  charm  to  curtain  all  his  days, 
A  passive  languor  of  oblivious  dream. 

Thou  hauntest  twilight  regions,  and  the  trance 
Of  moonless  nights  when  stars  are  few  and  wan : 

Within  black  woods ;   or  over  the  expanse 
Of  desert  seas  abysmal ;  or  upon 

Old  solitary  shores  whose  populous  graves 

Are  rocked  in  rest  by  ever-moaning  waves  ; 
Or  through  vast  ruined  cities  still  and  lone. 


lo  our  Ladies  of  Death.  83 

The  weak,  the  weary,  and  the  desolate, 

The  poor,  the  mean,  the  outcast,  the  opprest, 

All  trodden  down  beneath  the  march  of  Fate, 
Thou  gatherest,  loving  Sister,  to  thy  breast. 

Soothing  their  pain  and  weariness  asleep ; 

Then  in  thy  hidden  Dreamland  hushed  and  deep 
Dost  lay  them,  shrouded  in  eternal  rest. 

O  sweetest  Sister,  and  Sole  Patron  Saint 

Of  all  the  humble  eremites  who  flee 
From  out  life's  crowded  tumult,  stunned  and  faint, 

To  seek  a  stem  and  lone  tranquility 
In  Libyan  wastes  of  time :  my  hopeless  life 
With  famished  yearning  craveth  rest  from  strife; 

Therefore,  thou  Restful  One,  I  call  on  Thee  I 

Take  me,  and  lull  me  into  perfect  sleep ; 

Down,  down,  far-hidden  in  thy  duskiest  cave ; 
While  all  the  clamorous  years  above  me  sweep 

Unheard,  or,  like  the  voice  of  seas  that  rave 
On  far-off  coasts,  but  murmuring  o'er  my  trance, 
A  dim  vast  monotone,  that  shall  enhance 

The  restful  rapture  of  the  inviolate  grave. 

Upgathered  thus  in  thy  divine  embrace, 

Upon  mine  eyes  thy  soft  mesmeric  hand, 
While  wreaths  of  opiate  odour  interlace 

About  my  pulseless  brow ;  babe-pure  and  bland, 
Passionless,  senseless,  thoughtless,  let  me  dream 
Some  ever-slumbrous,  never-varying  theme. 

Within  the  shadow  of  thy  Timeless  Land. 


84  To  our  Ladies  of  Death. 

That  when  I  thus  have  drunk  my  inmost  fill 
Of  perfect  peace,  I  may  arise  renewed ; 

In  soul  and  body,  intellect  and  will, 

Equal  to  cope  with  Life  whate'er  its  mood ; 

To  sway  its  storm  and  energise  its  calm ; 

Through  rhythmic  years  evolving  like  a  psalm 
Of  infinite  love  and  faith  and  sanctitude. 

But  if  this  cannot  be,  no  less  I  cry, 

Come,  lead  me  with  thy  terrorless  control 

Down  to  our  Mother's  bosom,  there  to  die 
By  abdication  of  my  separate  sou!  : 

So  shall  this  single,  self -impelling  piece 

Of  mechanism  from  lone  labour  cease. 
Resolving  into  union  with  the  Whole. 

Our  mother  feedeth  thus  our  little  life. 

That  we  in  turn  may  feed  her  with  our  death  : 

The  great  Sea  sways,  one  interwoven  strife, 
Wherefrom  the  Sun  exhales  a  subtle  breath, 

To  float  the  heavens  sublime  in  form  and  hue. 

Then  turning  cold  and  dark  in  order  due 

Rain  weeping  back  to  swell  the  Sea  beneath. 

One  part  of  me  shall  feed  a  little  worm, 
And  it  a  bird  on  which  a  man  may  feed  ; 

One  lime  the  mould,  one  nourish  insect-sperm  ; 
One  thrill  sweet  grass,  one  pulse  in  bitter  weed ; 

This  swell  a  fruit,  and  that  evolve  in  air ; 

Another'trickle  to  a  springlet's  lair, 
Another  paint  a  daisy  on  the  mead : 


To  our  Ladies  of  Death.  85 

With  cosmic  interchange  of  parts  for  all, 

Through  all  the  modes  of  being  numberless 
Of  every  element,  as  may  befall. 

And  if  earth's  general  soul  hath  consciousness. 
Their  new  life  must  with  strange  new  joy  be  thrilled. 
Of  perfect  law  all  perfectly  fulfilled  ; 

No  sin,  no  fear,  no  fail'ure,  no  excess. 

Weary  of  living  isolated  life, 

Weary  of  hoping  hopes  for  ever  vain, 
Weary  of  struggling  in  all-sterile  strife. 

Weary  of  thought  which  maketh  nothing  plain, 
I  close  my  eyes  and  hush  my  panting  breath, 
And  yearn  for  Thee,  divinely  tranquil  Death, 

To  come  and  soothe  away  my  bitter  pain. 


INSOMNIA. 

'  Sleepless  tdmselt  to  give  to  others  sleep. 
"  He  giveth  His  beloved  sleep." 


I  heard  the  sounding  of  the  midnight  hour  ; 
The  others  one  by  one  had  left  the  room, 
In  calm  assurance  that  the  gracious  power 

Of  Sleep's  fine  alchemy  would  bless  the  gloom, 
Transmuting  all  its  leaden  weight  to  gold, 
To  treasures  of  rich  virtues  manifold, 

New  strength,  new  health,  new  life  ; 
Just  weary  enough  to  nestle  softly,  sweetly, 
Into  divine  unconsciousness,  completely 
Delivered  from  the  world  of  toil  and  care  and  strife. 

Just  weary  enough  to  feel  assured  of  rest, 

Of  Sleep's  divine  oblivion  and  repose, 
Renewing  heart  and  brain  for  richer  zest, 

Of  waking  life  when  golden  morning  glows. 
As  young  and  pure  and  glad  as  if  the  first 
That  ever  on  the  void  of  darkness  burst 

With  ravishing  warmth  and  light  ; 
On  dewy  grass  and  flowers  and  blithe  birds  singing. 
And  shining  waters,  all  enraptured  springing, 
Fragrance  and  siiiue  and  song,  out  of  the  womb  of  night. 


88  Insomnia. 

But  I  with  infinite  weariness  outworn, 

Haggard  with  endless  nights  unblessed  by  sleep, 
Ravaged  by  thoughts  unutterably  forlorn, 
Plunged  in  despairs  unfathomably  deep. 
Went  cold  and  pale  and  trembling  with  affright 
Into  the  desert  vastitude  of  Night, 

Arid  and  wild  and  black  ; 
Forebodmg  no  oasis  of  sweet  slumber, 
Counting  beforehand  all  the  countless  number 
Of  sands  that  are  its  minutes  on  my  desolate  track. 

And  so  I  went,  the  last,  to  my  drear  bed, 

Aghast  as  one  who  should  go  down  to  lie 
Among  the  blissfully  unconscious  dead, 

Assured  that  as  the  endless  years  flowed  by 
Over  the  dreadful  silence  and  deep  gloom 
And  dense  oppression  of  the  stifling  tomb, 

He  only  of  them  all. 
Nerveless  and  impotent  to  madness,  never 
Could  hope  oblivion's  perfect  trance  for  ever  : 
An  agony  of  life  eternal  in  death's  pall. 

But  that  would  be  for  ever,  without  cure !  — 
And  yet  the  agony  be  not  more  great ; 

Supreme  fatigue  and  pain,  while  they  endure. 
Into  Eternity  their  time  translate  ; 

Be  it  of  hours  and  days  or  countless  years. 

And  boundless  asons,  it  alike  appears 
To  the  crushed  victim's  soul; 

Utter  despair  foresees  no  termination, 

But  feels  itself  of  infinite  duration; 
The  smallest  fragment  instant  comprehends  the  whole. 


Insomnia.  89 

The  absolute  of  torture  as  of  bliss 

Is  timeless,  each  transcending  time  and  space ; 
The  one  an  infinite  obscure  abyss, 

The  other  an  eternal  Heaven  of  grace.  — 
Keeping  a  little  lamp  of  glimmering  light 
Companion  through  the  horror  of  the  night. 

I  laid  me  down  aghast 
As  he  of  all  who  pass  death's  quiet  portal 
Malignantly  reserved  alone  immortal. 
In  consciousness  of  bale  that  must  for  ever  last. 

I  laid  me  down  and  closed  my  heavy  eyes, 

As  if  sleep's  mockery  might  win  true  sleep  ;  1 

And  grew  aware,  with  awe  but  not  surprise. 

Blindly  aware  through  all  the  silence  deep, 
Of  some  dark  Presence  watching  by  my  bed. 
The  awful  image  of  a  nameless  dread  ; 

But  I  lay  still  fordone  ; 
And  felt  its  Shadow  on  me  dark  and  solemn 
And  steadfast  as  a  monumental  column, 
And  thought  drear  thoughts  of  Doom,  and  heard  the  bells  chime  One. 

And  then  I  raised  my  weary  eyes  and  saw. 

By  some  slant  moonlight  on  the  ceiling  thrown 
And  faint  lamp-gleam,  that  Image  of  my  awe. 

Still  as  a  pillar  of  basaltic  stone. 
But  all  enveloped  in  a  sombre  shroud 
Except  the  wan  face  drooping  heavy-lrcowed, 

With  sad  eyes  fixed  on  mine ; 
Sad  weary  yearning  eyes,  but  fixed  remorseless 
Upon  my  eyes  yet  wearier,  that  were  forceless 
To  bear  the  cruel  pressure;  cruel,  unmalign. 


QC"  Insomnia. 

Wherefore  I  asked  for  what  I  knew  too  well : 
O  ominous  midnight  Presence,  ^^^lat  art  Thou  ? 

Whereto  in  tones  that  sounded  like  a  knell : 
"  I  am  the  Second  Hour,  appointed  now 

To  watch  beside  thy  slumberless  unrest  ** 

Then  I :  Thus  both,  unlike,  alike  unblest ; 
For  I  should  sleep,  you  fly : 

Are  not  those  wings  beneath  thy  mantle  moulded  ? 

O  Hour !  unfold  those  wings  so  straitly  folded, 
And  urge  thy  natural  flight  beneath  the  moonlit  sky. 

"  My  wings  shall  open  when  your  eyes  shall  close 

In  real  slumber  from  this  waking  drear ; 
Your  wild  unrest  is  my  enforced  ref>ose  ; 

Ere  I  move  hence  you  must  not  know  me  here." 
Could  not  your  wings  fan  slimiber  through  my  brain, 
Soothing  away  its  weariness  and  pain  ? 

"  Your  sleep  must  stir  my  wings : 
Sleep,  and  I  bear  you  gently  on  my  pinions 
Athwart  my  span  of  hollow  night's  dominions. 
Whence  hour  on  hour  shall  bear  to  morning's  golden  springs. 

That  which  I  ask  of  you.  you  ask  of  me. 

O  weary  Hour,  thus  standing  sentinel 
Against  your  nature,  as  I  feel  and  see 

Against  my  own  your  form  immovable : 
Could  I  bring  Sleep  to  set  you  on  the  wing. 
What  other  thing  so  gladly  would  I  bring  .' 

Truly  the  Poet  saith  : 
If  that  is  best  whose  absence  we  deplore  most. 
Whose  presence  in  our  longings  is  the  foremost, 
What  blessings  equal  Sleep  save  only  love  and  death  .* 


Insomnia.  91 

I  let  my  lids  fall,  sick  of  thought  and  sense. 

But  felt  that  Shadow  heavy  on  my  heart: 
And  saw  the  night  before  me  an  immense 

Black  waste  of  ridge-wails,  hour  by  hour  apart, 
Di\-iding  deep  ra\-ines :  from  ridge  to  ridge 
Sleep's  flying  hour  was  an  aerial  bridge  ; 

But  I,  whose  hours  stood  fast. 
Must  climb  down  painfully  each  steep  side  hither, 
And  climb  more  painfully  each  steep  side  thither. 
And  so  make  one  hour's  span  for  years  of  tra^-ail  last. 

Thus  I  went  down  into  that  first  ravine. 

Wearily,  slowly,  blindly,  and  alone, 
Staggering,  stumbling,  sinking  depths  unseen, 

Shaken  and  bruised  and  gashed  by  stub  and  stone ; 
And  at  the  bottom  paven  with  slipperiness, 
A  torrent-brook  rushed  headlong  with  such  stress 

Against  my  feeble  limbs, 
Such  fury  of  wave  and  foam  and  icy  bleakness 
Buffetting  insupportably  my  weakness 
That  when  I -svould  recall,  dazed  memory  swirls  and  swims. 

How  I  got  through  I  know  not.  faint  as  death  ; 

And  then  I  had  to  climb  the  awful  scarp. 
Creeping  with  many  a  pause  for  panting  breath. 

Clinging  to  tangled  root  and  rock-jut  sharp ; 
Perspiring  with  faint  chills  instead  of  heat. 
Trembling,  and  bleeding  hands  and  knees  and  feet ; 

Falling,  to  rise  anew ; 
Until,  with  lamentable  toil  and  travel 
Upon  the  ridge  of  arid  sand  and  gravel 
I  lay  supine  half-dead  and  heard  the  bells  chime  Two: 


92  Insomnia. 

And  knew  a  change  of  Watchers  in  the  room, 

Without  a  stir  or  sound  beside  my  bed  ; 
Only  the  tingling  silence  of  the  gloom,  , 

The  muffled  pulsing  of  the  night's  deep  dread; 
And  felt  an  image  mightier  to  appal, 
And  looked ;  the  moonlight  on  the  bed-foot  wall 

And  corniced  ceiling  white 
Was  slanting  now ;   and  in  the  midst  stood  solemn 
And  hopeless  as  a  black  sepulchral  column 
A  steadfast  shrouded  Form,  the  Third  Hour  of  the  night. 

The  fixed  regard  implacably  austere, 
Yet  none  the  less  ineffably  forlorn. 
Something  transcending  all  my  former  fear 

Came  jarring  through  my  shattered  frame  outworn : 
I  knew  that  crushing  rock  could  not  be  stirred ; 
I  had  no  heart  to  say  a  single  word. 

But  closed  my  eyes  again ; 
And  set  me  shuddering  to  my  task  stupendous 
Of  climbing  down  and  up  that  gulph  tremendous 
Unto  the  next  hour-ridge  beyond  Hope's  farthest  ken. 

Men  sigh  and  plain  and  wail  how  life  is  brief : 

Ah  yes,  our  bright  eternities  of  bliss 
Are  transient,  rare,  minute  beyond  belief, 

Mere  star-dust  meteors  in  Time's  night-abyss; 
Ah  no,  our  black  eternities  intense 
Of  bale  are  lasting,  dominant,  immense, 

As  Time  which  is  their  breath ; 
The  memory  of  the  bliss  is  yearning  sorrow. 
The  memory  of  the  bale  clouds  every  morrow 
Darkening  through  nights  and  days  unto  the  night  of  Death. 


Insomnia.  93 

No  human  words  could  paint  my  travail  sore 

In  the  thick  darkness  of  the  next  ravine. 
Deeper  immeasurably  than  that  before ; 

When  hideous  agonies,  unheard,  unseen, 
In  overwhelming  floods  of  torture  roll, 
And  horrors  of  great  darkness  drown  the  soul, 

To  be  is  not  to  be 
In  memory  save  as  ghastliest  impression, 

And  chaos  of  demoniacal  possession 

I  shuddered  on  the  ridge,  and  heard  the  bells  chime  Three. 

And  like  a  pillar  of  essential  gloom, 

Most  terrible  in  stature  and  regard. 
Black  in  the  moonlight  filling  all  the  room 

The  Image  of  the  Fourth  Hour,  evil-starred, 
Stood  over  me ;  but  there  was  Something  more, 
Something  behind  It  undiscerned  before,   i 

More  dreadful  than  Its  dread, 
Which  overshadowed  it  as  with  a  fateful 
Inexorable  fascination  hateful,  — 
A  wan  and  formless  Shade  from  regions  of  the  dead. 

I  shut  my  eyes  against  that  spectral  Shade, 
Which  yet  allured  them  with  a  deadly  charm, 

And  that  black  Image  of  the  Hour,  dismayed 
By  such  tremendous  menacing  of  harm  ; 

And  so  into  the  gulph  as  into  Hell ; 

Where  what  immeasurable  depths  I  fell. 
With  seizures  of  the  heart 

Whose  each  clutch  seemed  the  end  of  all  pulsation. 

And  tremors  of  exanimate  prostration. 
Are  horrors  in  my  soul  that  never  can  depart. 


94  Insomnia. 

If  I  for  hope  or  wish  had  any  force, 

It  was  that  I  might  rush  down  sharply  hurled 
From  rock  to  rock  until  a  mangled  corse 

Down  with  the  fury  of  the  torrent  whirled, 
The  fury  of  black  waters  and  white  foam, 
To  where  the  homeless  find  their  only  home. 

In  the  immense  void  Sea, 
Whose  isles  are  worlds,  surrounding,  unsurrounded. 
Whose  depths  no  mortal  plummet  ever  sounded, 
Beneath  all  surface  storm  calm  in  Eternity. 

Such  hope  or  wish  was  as  a  feeble  spark, 

A  little  lamp's  pale  glimmer  in  a  tomb. 

To  just  reveal  the  hopeless  deadly  dark 

And  wordless  horrors  of  my  soul's  fixed  doom  : 
Yet  some  mysterious  instinct  obstinate. 
Blindly  unconscious  as  a  law  of  Fate, 

Still  urged  me  on  and  bore 
My  shattered  being  through  the  unfeared  peril 
Of  death  less  hateful  than  the  life  as  sterile : 
I  shuddered  on  the  ridge,  and  heard  the  bells  chime  Four. 

Tiie  Image  of  that  Fifth  Hour  of  the  night 
Was  blacker  in  the  moonlight  now  aslant 

Upon  its  left  than  on  its  shrouded  right ; 
And  over  and  behind  It,  dominant, 

The  Shadow  not  Its  shadow  cast  its  spell, 

Most  vague  and  dim  and  wan  and  terrible. 
Death's  ghastly  aureole. 

Pregnant  with  overpowering  fascination, 

Commanding  by  repulsive  instigation, 
Despair's  envenomed  anodyne  to  tempt  the  Soul. 


Insomnia.  95 

T  closed  my  eyes,  but  could  no  longer  keep 

Under  that  Image  and  most  awful  Shade, 
Supine  in  mockery  of  blissful  sleep, 

Delirious  with  such  fierce  thirst  unallayed  ; 
Of  all  worst  agonies  the  most  unblest 
Is  passive  agony  of  wild  unrest : 
Trembling  and  faint  I  rose, 
And  dressed  witli  painful  efforts,  and  descended 
With  furtive  footsteps  and  with  breath  suspended, 
And  left  the  slumbering  house  with  my  unslumbering  woes. 

Constrained  to  move  through  the  unmoving  hours, 
Accurst  from  rest  because  the  hours  stood  still; 

Feeling  the  hands  of  the  Infernal  Powers 
Heavy  upon  me  for  enormous  ill, 

Inscrutable  intolerable  pain, 

Against  which  mortal  pleas  and  prayers  are  vain, 
Gaspings  of  dying  breath, 

And  human  struggles,  dying  spasms  yet  vainer: 

Renounce  defence  when  Doom  is  the  Arraigner ; 
Let  impotence  oi  Life  subside  appeased  in  Death. 

I  paced  the  silent  and  deserted  streets 

In  cold  dark  shade  and  chillier  moonlight  grey  ; 

Pondering  a  dolorous  series  of  defeats 

And  black  disasters  from  life's  opening  day. 

Invested  with  the  shadow  of  a  doom 

That  filled  the  Spring  and  Summer  with  a  gloom 
Most  wintry  bleak  and  drear ; 

Gloom  from  within  as  from  a  sulphurous  censer 

Making  the  glooms  without  for  ever  denser. 
To  blight  the  buds  and  flowers  and  fruitage  of  my  year. 


^^ 

«MBMikfliM^Hi«»r« 


/ni,<mm,i 


97 


•  II..W    lit. in  lliiiac  liitlroiia   Mdlcl.cdyoa   clocjj 

1  over  couitt  svtn  tmck  In  ii|it)oi  aailli, 
UralulDtl  lit  h(Un«tll  hlyllla  til    lilcaacd  alcep 

All. I  hcjlihy  wakliiji  wlil>  ilio  new  tlayV  Idnlir'^ 
ttuw  tlo  men  cllmli  back  Irom  t»  owucm  whoao  strciM, 
Cruahing  lar  deeper  than  all  ctinaLlcniaiipaa, 

la  deep  as  deep  dcBlh  »ecni»  ? 
WIto  can  the  aleps  and  atat^ca  nietc  and  nuthb«r 
Hy  which  wo  rc-onicrKe  liuin  nii/iiily  »lund»oi  t  — 
Uui  poor  vast  prtly  lllr  i»  uiir  (Uik  inj^c  nl    ilicutna 

Marfk,  1 88 a. 


BIBLIOGRAPHY 

BY 

BERTRAM  DOBELL  and  J.  M.  WHEELER 
LONDON 


Note.  Previous  to  the  friendship  contracted  by  Mr. 
Bertram  Dobell  with  James  Thomson,  the  chances 
were  that  his  poetry  had  remained  for  years  unpublished, 
in  book  form.  Few  and  far  between  were  readers  who 
knew  of  its  buried  existence  in  the  unpopular-  pages  of 
fiercely  agnostic  journals  and  reviews. 

Mr.  Dobell's  cordial  appreciation  changed  all  that,  and 
to  him  more  than  to  any  other  may  be  ascribed  those 
gleams  of  prosperity  and  hopes  of  help  known  to  the  poet 
in  his  "lonesome  latter  years." 

The  present  Bibliography,  compiled  with  the  assistance 

of  Mr.  J.  M.  Wheeler,  is  therefore  a  fitting  finale  to 

this  long  series  of  kindly  acts  and  undiminished  regard  for 

the  fame  of  one  who  only  desired  to  be  known  as  "  B.  V." 

"Ergo  in  perpetuum, /rater,  ave  atque  vale  /  " 


BIBLIOGRAPHY.- 

1 

SEPARATE  WORKS. 

The  Story  of  a  Famous  Old  Jewish  Firm. 
By  B.  V.  Price  twopence.  Published  at  13 
Booksellers'  Row,  Strand,  London,  W.  C. 
Crown  8vo,  pp.  16. 

A  Commission  of  Inquiry  on  Royalty,  etc. 
By  B.  V.  Price  twopence.  Published  at  13 
Booksellers'  Row,  Strand,  London,  W.  C. 
Crown  8vo,  pp.  16. 

(  These  pamphlets  are  not  dated,  but  they  were 
both  published  in  1876). 

The  City  of  Dreadful  Night  and  other 
Poems.  By  James  Thomson  (B.  V.).  Lon- 
don: 196  Strand.  1880.  Crown  8 vo,  half- 
title,  title,  dedication  and  contents,  4  leaves 
and  pp.  184. 

( The  edition  '^of  this  work  consisted  of  one 
thousand  ordinary  copies,  and  forty  on  large 
paper.) 

Vane's  Story,  Weddah  and  Om-el-Bonatn, 
and  Other  Poems.  By  James  Thomson, 
author  of  "The  City  of  Dreadful  Night." 
London:  Reeves  &  Turner,  196  Strand.  1881. 
Crown  8vo,  pp.  viii  and  184. 

{The  edition  of  this  work  consisted  of  the 
same  number  of  copies  as  "  The  City  of  Dread- 
ful Nights  Nearly  one-half  of  the  edition  was 
destroyed  by  fire. ) 


02  Bibliography. 

Essays  and  Phantasies.  By  James  Thom- 
son, author  of  "  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night, 
and  Other  Poems  " ;  "  Vane's  Story,  Wed- 
dah  and  Om-el- Bonain,  and  Other  Poems." 
London:  Reeves  &  Turner,  196  Strand.  1881. 
Crown  8vo,  half-title,  title  and  table  of  con- 
tents, 3  leaves  and  pp.  320. 

( The  edition  of  this  work  consisted  of  one 
thousand  copies.  More  than  one-half  of  it  was 
destroyed  by  fire.) 

Address  on  the  Opening  of  the  Newt  Hall 
OF  THE  Leicester  Secular  Society,  Sun- 
day, March  6,  i88r,  delivered  by  Mrs.  Theo- 
dore Wright.  Written  by  James  Thomson 
(B.  v.),  author  of  "The  City  of  Dreadful 
Night"  and  "Vane's  Story."  Crown  8vo, 
pp.8. 

The  Story  of  a  Famous  Old  Jewish  Firm, 
and  Other  Pieces,  in  prose  and  rhyme,  by 
the  late  James  Thomson  (B.  V.),  with  an  In- 
troduction by  B.  E.,  and  "  In  our  Forest  of 
the  Past";  "Life's  Hebe";  "L'Ancien  Re- 
gime " ;  "  Address  on  the  Opening  of  the 
Leicester  Hall";  "Two  Lovers,"  etc.  Im- 
printed by  B.  E.  and  W.  L.  S.,  Anno  1883. 
Sold  by  Abel  Heywood  &  Son,  and  by  John 
Heywood,  Manchester  and  London.  Square 
24mo,  pp.  98. 

[Of  this  pamphlet  some  large  paper  copies 
were  issued.,  which  contained  a  portrait  of  the 
author  and  a  facsimile  of  his  handwriting.) 


Bibliography.  103 

8  A  Voice  from  the  Nile  and  Other  Poems. 
By  the  late  James  Thomson  (B.  V.),  author 
of  "  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night,"  "  Vane's 
Story,"  and  "  Essays  and  Phantasies."  With 
a  Memoir  of  the  author,  by  Bertram  Dobell. 
London:  Reeves  &  Turner,  196  Strand,  1884. 
Crown  8vo,  pp.  xlix  and  263,  with  a  portrait. 

[^The  edition  of  this  work  consisted  of  one 
thousand  ordinary  copies^  and  forty  on  large 
paper.  More  than  one-half  of  the  impression 
was  destroyed  by  fire.) 

<9  Satires  and  Profanities.  By  James  Thom- 
son (B.  v.),  with  a  Preface  by  G.  W.  Foote. 
London:  Progressive  Publishing  Company, 
28  Stonecutter  Street,  E.  C,  1884.  Crown 
8vo,  pp.  viii  and  191. 

{ The  edition  of  this  work  consisted  of  three 
thousand  copies,  but  nearly  the  whole  of  it  was 
destroyed  by  fire.) 

10  Shelley,  a  Porm,  with  other  writings  relat- 
ing to  Shelley,  by  the  late  James  Thomson 
(B.  V.)  ;  to  which  is  added  an  Essay  on  the 
Poems  of  William  Blake,  by  the  same  author. 
Printed  for  private  circulation,  by  Charles 
Whittingham  &  Co.,  at  the  Chiswick  Press, 
1884.     8vo,  boards,  pp.  xii  and  128. 

[Of  this  volume  only  one  hundred  and 
ninety  copies  were  printed,  thirty  of  which  are 
on  Whatman^ s  handmade  paper.) 


1 04  Bibliography. 

\  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night,  and  Other 
Poems.  By  James  Thomson  (B.  V.),  second 
edition.  London :  Reeves  &  Turner,  196 
Strand,  and  Bertram  Dobell,  Charing  Cross 
Road,  1888.     Crown  8vo,  4  leaves  and  pp.  184. 

( The  edition  consiited  of  one  thousand  ordi- 
nary copies  and  fifty  on  handmade  paper.  A 
part  of  it  was  destroyed  by  fire.) 

2  Selections  from  Original  Contributions. 

By  James  Thomson  to  Cope's  Tobacco 
Plant.  Liverpool :  At  the  office  of  "  Cope's 
Tobacco  Plant,"  1889.  Price  threepence.  Be- 
ing No.  3  of  "  Cope's  Smoke-room  Booklets," 
with  an  "Introductory  Notice "  by  Walter 
Lewin.     Crown  8vo,  pp.  64. 

3  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night.     By  James 

Thomson,  with  Introduction  by  E.  Cavazza. 
Printed  for  Thomas  B.  Mosher,  and  published 
by  him  at  37  Exchange  Street,  Portland,  Me. 
MDCCCXCII. 

{Four  hundred  small  paper  copies  on  Van 
Gelder's  handmade  paper  (Post  Svo),  numbered 
from  1  to  4-00 ;  forty  large  paper  copies  on  Van 
Gelders  handmade  paper  (Post  i-to),  numbered 
from  1  to  40 ;  ten  large  paper  copies  on  Japan 
vellum,^  numbered  from  1  to  10,  signed  by 
publisher.) 


Bibliography,  105 

II 

CONTRIBUTIONS  TO  PERIODICALS. 

I.    The  London  Investigator. 
1858. 
V.     Mr.  Save-His-Soul-Alive,    OI   (verse).     By    Bysshe 
Vanolis,  February. 
Co^C.   Notes  on  Emerson,  December  i. 

1859. 

^  The  King's  Friend,  February  i. 

^^ .  A  Fe'.v  Words  about  Burns,  April  i. 

(It  was  in  this  magazine  that  Thomson 
"  first  used  the  signature  of  B.  V.,'  by  which  he 
was'afterward  so  well  known  to  the  readers  of 
the  National  Reformer.  '  Bj'sshe  Vanolis ' 
was  a  nom-de-plume  adopted  out  of  reverence 
for  Shelley  and  Xovalis,  Vanolis  being  an  ana- 
gram of  the  latter  name."    Salt's  Life,  p.  46.) 


TI.    Tait's  Edinburgh  Magazine. 


The  Fadeless  Bower,*  July. 
Four  Stages  in  a  Life,*  October. 

1859. 
A  Festival  of  Life,*  April. 
Tasso  to  Leonora,*  May. 
The  Cypress  and  the  Roses,  June. 
Withered  Leaves,  July. 
The  Jolly  Veterans,*  August. 
A  Capstan  Chorus,  August. 

Bertram   to  the   Most  Noble  and  Beautiful    Lady 
Geraldine,  November. 


io6  Bibliography. 

To  Arabella  Goddard,*  November. 
The  Happy  Poet,  December. 

i860. 
The  Purple  Flower  of  the  Heather,*  January. 
A  Winter's  Night  (poem),  January. 
The  Lord  of  the  Castle  of  Indolence,*  March, 
An  Old  Dream,*  June. 

♦Contributions    marked  with   an   asterisk 
are  signed  "  Crepusculus." 


ni.     The  National  Reformer  (London). 

i860. 
A  Letter  addressed  to  the  Editor,  on  Shelley's  Re- 
ligious Opinions,  August  26. 
.   Scrap  Book  Leaves,  Nos.  i  and  2,  Sept.  i  and  22. 
~  Shelley  (an  Essay,  reprinted  in  Shelley,  a  poem,  etc., 
1884),  December  22. 

1861. 
V   The  Dead  Year  (verse),  January  6. 
1862. 
"^  The  Established  Church.     Its  real,  as  distinguished 
from  its  apparent,  strength,  November  15. 
Heresy  (a  sonnet),  November  22. 
Elizabeth  Barrett  Browning  (verse),  November  29. 
The  Mountain  Voice  (from  Heine),  December  6. 
"     The  Life  of  Moses,  by  J.  Lolsky  (a  review),  Dec.  13. 
■  Songs  from  Heine  (three  short  pieces),  December  20. 
The  Greek  Gods  (from  Heine),  December  27. 

1863. 
'   The  Meaning  of  History,  by  F.  Harrison  (a  review). 

January  3. 
^  To  the  Youngest  of  Our  Ladies  of  Death,  Feb.  28. 


Bibliography.  107 

1864. 
~  Thomas   Cooper's   Argument  for  the  Existence  of 

Deity  (satirical  verses),  February  13. 
'The  Good  God  (from  Beranger),  July  11. 
Poems   and    Songs,   by   J.  M.  Peacock  (a   review), 
November  19. 

1865. 
The  Athenasian  Creed,  January  i. 
-  Body  and  Soul  (from  Heine),  February  5. 
"The  Death  of  the  Devil  (from  Beranger),  March  26. 
•^  The  Almighty  Devil  (a  letter  in  which  he  refers  to 

some  lines  in  Vane's  Story),  July  30. 
<■■'   Mr.  Kingsley's  Convertites,  September  24. 

Rumble,  Bumbledom,  Bumbleism,  October   29  and 

November  5. 
Per  Contra :  The  Poet,  High  Art,  Genius,  Novem- 
ber 12  and  19. 
An  Evening  with  Spenser,  November  26. 
Mr.  Gladstone's  Edinburgh  Address,  December  10. 
\-    Virtue  and  Vice  (verse),  December  17. 

The  Story  of  a  Famous  Old  Firm,  Dec.  24  and  31. 

1866. 
Christmas  Eve  in  tb.e  Upper  Circles,  January  7. 
Poems   of    William    Blake,  January    14,  21,  28,  and 
February  4. 
'    Four  Scraps  from  Heine,  February  11. 

Open  Secret  Societies,  Feb.  18,  25,  and  March  4. 
Jesus:  as  God;  as  a  Man,  March  18. 
,    The  Polish  Insurgent  (1863),  A' Timely  Prayer  (epi- 
gram), March  18. 
Vane's  Story,  May  13,  27  ;  June  3,  10. 
Liberty  and  Necessity,  May  20. 

Goethe's    Israel    in    the  Wilderness,  June    17,    24; 
July  I,  8. 


io8  Bibliography. 

Who  Killed  Moses  ?  (verse)  July  15. 

Sunday  at  Hampstead,  July  15,  22. 

The  One  Thmg  Needful,  August  5. 

Suggested  from  Southampton  (epigram  on  Kingsley) , 

September  2. 
Sayings  of  Sigvat,  September  30,  October  14. 
Polycrates  (on  Waterloo  Bridge),  October  14. 
A  Word  for  Xantippe,  October  21. 
Sympathy,  Oct.  28,  November  18  and  25. 
Versicles  (three  epigrams),  November  25. 
The  Swinburne  Controversy,  December  23. 

1867. 

Life's  Hebe,  January  13. 

Philosophy,  January  20. 

The  Saturday  Re^dew  on  Mr.  Bright's  edition  of  Mr- 
Bright,  February  3. 

Giordano  Bruno,  February  10,  24 ;  March  3. 

Art,  February  17. 

A  Walk  Abroad,  April  21. 

The  Saturday  Review  and  the  National  Reformer, 
April  28  and  May  5. 

Heine  on  Kant,  May  19. 

Heine  on  Spinoza,  May  26,  June  2. 

Heine  on  an  liiustrioiis  Exile  with  Something  about 
Whales,  June  9,  16. 

The  Naked  Goddess,  June  23. 

The  Gift  for  Our  Lord  the  King,  July  7. 

A  Lady  of  Sorrow,  July  14,  21,  28;  August  4,  11, 
18,  25;  September  i. 

They  Chanted,  August  i8. 

Day.     Night.     (Two  poems),  August  25. 

A  Requiem,  September  i. 

The  Pan  Anglican  Synod  (verse),  October  13. 

Copernicus :  a  Dialogue  (from  Leopardi),  Nov.  3,  10. 


t 


Bibliography.  109 

■  Europe's  Rouge  et  Xoir  (epigram),  November  24. 
Dialogue    between   a   Natural    Philosopher   and   a 
Metaphysician  (from  Leopardi),  December  i. 
Dialogue    of   Timander  and  pleander   (from  Leo- 
pardi), December  8,  15. 
Dialogue  between  Nature  and  the  Soul  (from   Leo- 
pardi), December  29. 

1868. 

Dialogue  of  Christopher  Columbus  and  Peter  Gu- 
tierrez (from  Leopardi),  January  5. 

Two  Lovers,  January  5. 

Dialogue  between  Frederic  Ruysch  and  his  Mum- 
mies (from  Leopardi),  January  26. 

A  German  Village  School  (signed  X),  January  26. 

Dialogue  between  Tristan  and  a  Friend  (from  Leop- 
ardi), February  9,  16. 

Dialogues  between  a  Vendor  of  Almanacs  and  a 
Passer-by  (from  Leopardi),  March  15. 

In  Praise  of  Birds  (from  Leopardi),  March  22. 

Dialogue  of  Plotinus  and  Poiphyry  (from  Leo- 
pardi), April  5,  12. 

Comparison  of  the  Last  Words  of  Brutus  the 
Younger,  an*  Theophrastus  (from  Leopardi), 
May  3,  17. 

Selection  from  the  Thoughts  of  Leopardi,  May  31 ; 
June  7. 

1869-70. 

"The  Pilgrim  and  the  Shrine,"  and  its  Critics, 
August  29,  1869. 

Leopardi,  October  3,  10,  17;  November  7,  21,28; 
December  12,  1869;  January  2,  9,  16;  Febru- 
ary 6,  1870. 


no  Bibliography. 

1870. 

Paul  Louis  Courier,  July  31 ;  August  7,  14. 

Prometheus,  July  31. 

How  the  Bible  Warns  against  Authorship,  Aug.  2t. 

Jottings,  September  4. 

How  Heine  Forewarned  France,  September  11. 

Commission  of  Inquiry  as  to  Complaints  against 
Royalty,  September  18. 

Paul  Louis  Courier  on  the  Land  Question,  Oct.  9. 

Paul  Louis  Courier  on  the  Character  of  the  People, 
October  16. 

Marcus  Aurelius  Antoninus,  October  23,  30  ;  No- 
vember 6. 

The  Assassination  of  Paul  Louis  Courier,  Oct.  30. 

Our  Visit  to  Aberdeen,  November  6,  13. 

Cowper's  Task  (New  Version),  November  13. 

Hints  for  Freethought  Novels,  November  20. 

A  Bible  Lesson  on  Monarchy,  November  27. 

Feuerbach's  Essence  of  Christianity,  December  4. 

Infidelity  in  the  United  States,  December  11. 

With  the  Christian  World,  December  18. 

1871. 
International  Socialism  in  Spain,  January  i. 
The  Divan  of  Goethe,  January  22. 
Strange  News  for  the  Secularists,  January  22. 
Atheism  in  Spain,  February  5. 
Anastasius,  February  12,  19. 

Association  for  Intercessory  Prayer,  February  26. 
Moxon's  cheap  edition  of  Shelley's  Poems,  Mar.  12. 
In  Exitu  Israel  (epigram),  March  19. 
Change  for  a  Bad  Napoleon  (epigram),  March  19. 
Insults  to  the  Church  in  Spain,  April  2. 
Poor  Indeed  (epigram),  April  9. 


Bibliography.  1 1 1 

The  Successors  who  did  not  Succeed  (two  epigrams), 

April  i6. 
Bless  thee !  thou  art  translated  (epigram),  April  23. 
Cross  Lines  from  Goethe  (epigram),  April  23. 
Another  Spanish  Atheistic  Periodical,  April  30. 
We  Croak  (epigram).  May  7. 
In  a  Christian  Churchyard  (epigram).  May  7. 
Proposals  for  the   Speedy  Extinction  of  Evil   and 

Misery,  August  27  ;  September   3,  10,  17,  24 

October  8,  22;  November  5,  12. 

1S71-72. 
Weddah  and  Om-el-Bonain,  November  19  ;  Decem- 
ber 3,  24,  1871;  January  21,  28,  1872. 

1872. 
Our  Congratulations  on  the  Recovery  of  His  Royal 

Highness  (Pathetic  Epitaph),  January  28. 
A  Song  of  Sighing,  April  28. 
In  the  Room,  May  19. 
Modem  Miracles  (signed  "A  Devotee  "),  October  27. 

1873. 
Religion  in  the  Rocky  Mountains,  March  30 ;  April 
13- 

(A  tliird  installment  was  promised  in  the 
National  Reformer  \)wXviQVQr  appeared;  it  was 
printed,  however,  in  Satires  and  Profanities, 
1884.) 

1874. 

The  City  of  Dreadful  Night,  March  22;  April  12, 
26;  May  17. 

Funeral  of  Mr.  Austin  Holyoake,  April  26. 

Jottings,  July  5,  12,  19,  26;  August  2,  16,  23,  30;  Sep- 
tember 6,  13,  20,  27  ;  October  25 ;  November 
I,  8,  15,  22,  29;  December  6,  13,  20. 


112  Bibliography. 

A  National  Reformer  in  the  Dog  Days,  July  rz,  19. 
Walt   Whitman,   July  26;  August    2,9,  16,   23,30; 

September  6. 
Uhland  in  English,  September  13,  20. 
Bishop  Alford  on  Professor  Tyndall,  September  27. 
Extra-Experimental  Beliefs,  October  11. 
Jesus  Christ,  our  Great  Exemplar,  October  25. 
The  Daily  News,  November  i. 
John   Stuart  Mill  on  Religion,  November  8,  15,32, 

29;  December  6,  13,  20,  27. 

1875- 

Henri  Beyle  (De  Stendhal),  January  31  ;  February 
7.  M- 

Jottings,  January  31  ;  February  7,  14,  21.  28;  March 
7,  14;  April  4,  25;  May  2. 

Raffaele  Sanzio,  February  28. 

Great  Christ  is  Dead,  March  14. 

The  Sankey  Hymns,  April  25. 

Archbishop  of  Canterbury  on  Fallacies  of  Unbe- 
lief, May  2. 

Mr.  Moody's  Addresses,  May  16. 

A  Popular  Sermon,  May  23. 

Some  May  Meeting  Figures,  May  30. 

Some  May  Meeting  Speeches,  June  6. 

Debate  between  Mr.  C.  Watts  and  Mr.  T.  B.  Wof- 
fendale,  June  13,  20. 

1891. 
Selections  from  the  MS.  Books  of  B.  V.,- April   19, 
26;  May  3,  10,  17,24;  June  7,  14;  July  5,  12, 
19;  August  23,  30. 


Bibliography.  113 

IV.     The  Secularist  (London). 

1876. 
Secularism  and  the  Bible,  January  i. 
By  the  Sea,  I.  (verse),  January  i. 
Reverberations  (a  review),  January  i. 
By  the  Sea,  II.  (verse),  January  8. 
Whitman  and  Swinburne,  January  8. 
Heinrich  Heine,  January  8,  15,  22,  29  ;  February  5,  12. 
By  the  Sea,  III.  and  IV.  (verse),  January  15. 
By  the  Sea,  V.  (verse),  January  22. 
Where?     (From  Heine),  January  29. 
The  Mountain  Voice  (From  Heine),  February  5. 
The  Pilgrimage  to  Kerlaar  (From  Heine),  Feb.  12. 
Arthur  Schopenhauer  (a  review),  February   19,  26 ; 

March  11. 
From  Heine  (poems),  February  19,26;  March  4,  11. 
The  Devil  in  the  Church  of  England,  February  26. 

March  4. 
Ccirlist  Reminiscences,  March  11,  18,  25;  April  i. 
Goblin  Market,  The  Prince's   Progress,  and  Other 

Poems,   by   Christma  G.  Rossetti  (a  review), 

March  25. 
A  Great  Modern  Astrologer,  April  i. 
A  Recusant  (the  sonnet    called   "  Heresy,"    already 

mentioned),  April  i. 
To  a  Pianiste  (a  reprint  of  the  verses  in  "  Tail,"  "  To 

Arabella  Goddard  "),  April  8. 
Dr.  Kenealy  in  a  New  Character,  April  8. 
The  Secular  Song  and  Hymn  Book,  edited  by  Annie 

Besant  (a  review),  April  8. 
Mr.  Matthew  Arnold  on   the  Church  of   England, 

April  8. 
Renan's  Memories  of  his  Childhood,  April  15. 
Religion  in  Japan,  April  22. 


114  Bibliography. 

Correspondence  (a  letter  on  Mr.  Bradlaugh's  notice 
of  the  review  of  Mrs.  Besant's  Hymn  Book), 
April  22. 

From  Heine  (three  poems),  April  29. 

"  The  Bugbears  of  Infidelity  "  at  Perth,  May  6. 

Among  the  Christians,  May  6. 

On  the  Worth  of  Metaphysical  Systems,  May  13. 

From  Heine  (two  poems).  May  13. 

Correspondence  (Mr.  G.  J.  Holyoake  on  Party  Uni- 
ty), May  13. 

The  Burial  Question  in  the  House  of  Lords,  May  20. 

Don  Giovanni  at  Covent  Garden,  May  20. 

The  Life  of  Jonathan  Swift,  by  John  Foster,  May  20. 

The  Standard  o-cs.  the  Whigs  and  the  Church,  May  27. 

The  Three  that  Shall  Be  One,  June  3. 

Beauchamp's  Career  (a  review),  June  3. 

A  Few  Words  on  the  System  of  Spinoza,  June  10. 

The  Leeds  Conferences,  June  17. 

From  Heine  (a  poem),  June  24. 

William  Godwin :  his  Friends  and  Contemporaries, 
by  C.  Kegan  Paul  (a  review),  June  24;  July 
I  and  8. 

Seen  Thrice:  a  London  Study,  July  8  and  15. 

The  Bishop  of  London's  Fund,  July  15. 

Mr.  Foote  at  the  Loudon  Hall  of  Science, July  15. 

Christian  Evidences,  Popular  and  Critical,  July  22,29. 

Indolence  :  a  Moral  Essay,  July  22,  29  ;  August  5. 

The  Resurrection  and  Ascension  of  Jesus,  Aug.  5. 

From  Heine  (Questions),  August  5. 

Some  Muslim  Laws  and  Beliefs,  August  12,  19. 

Shameless,  Kew  Gardens,  1865  (verse),  August  12. 

Sayings  of  Sigvat,  August  19. 

Low  Life  (verse),  August  19. 

Stray  Thoughts,  August  26. 

Among  the  Christians,  August  26. 


Bibliography.  115 

The  Christian  Wi>rld  and  the  Secularist  again,  Sep- 
tember 9. 

Pacchiarotto,  by  Rol^eit  Browning  (a  review), 
September  9. 

The  Loreley  (after  Heine),  September  9. 

Conversions  Sudden  and  Gradual,  September  16. 

The  Easter  Questions,  September  16. 

Correspondence:  September  "Mr.  G.  J.  Holyoake's 
Libels,"  September  16. 

On  the  Duty  of  Converts  to  Freethought,  Sept.  23. 

The  London  School  Board  Elections,  September  30. 

The  Cornhill  Magazine  on  Leopardi,  September  30. 

From  Heine  (a  poem),  September  30. 

La  Tentation  de  Saint  Antoine  par  Gustave  Flau- 
bert (a  review),  September  30;  October  7,  21, 
28 ;  November  4. 

The  Primate  on  the  Church  and  the  World,  Oct.  7. 

The  Daily  Neivs  on  Materialism,  October  7. 

From  Heine  (poems),  October  14;  November  4. 

Spiritism  in  the  Police  Court,  November  u. 

The  Huddersfield  Prosecution  of  a  "  Medium,"  No- 
vember 18. 

The  London  School  Board  Elections,  December  9. 

An  Inspired  Critic  on  Shelley,  December  9. 

Note  of  an  English  Republican  on  the  Muscovite 
Crusade,  by  A.  C.  Swinburne  (a  review),  De- 
cember 30. 

1877. 

Our  Obstructions,  January  6. 

Among  the  Christians,  January  6. 

The  Works  of  Francis  Rabelais  (a  review),  Jan.  6. 

In  Our  Forest  of  the  Past,  February  17. 

Song,"  The  Nightingale  was  not  yet  Heard,"  Feb.  17. 

Principal  Tulloch  on  Personal  Immortality,  Feb.  24. 


1 1 6  Bibliography . 

Prof.    Martineau   and  the   Rev.    H.  H.  Dobney  on 

Prayer,  March  3. 
The   Bi-centenary  of  Spinoza,  M.    Renan's  Address, 

March  10. 
The  Discourses  of  Epictetus,  translated  by  G.  Long 

(a  review),  April  14,  21  ;  May  5,  12. 
Secular  Review  and  Secularist. 
Trois  Contes,  par  Gustave  Flaubert  (a  review),  July 

21,  1877. 


V.     Cope's  Tobacco  Plant  (Liverpool). 

For  a  full  account  of  Thomson's  connection 
with  this  journal  see  SalVs  Life,  pp.  129-133; 
138-151;  167-174;  259.  A  complete  set  of  the 
Tobacco  Plant,  130  numbers,  begins  March,  1870, 
and  ends  January,  1881,  and  is  now  extremely 
scarce.  Besides  the  articles  named  in  our  list 
Thomson  also  did  a  considerable  amount  of 
book  reviewing  for  the  Plant,  more  particu- 
larly the  Smoke-room  Table  notices  of  "  Eng- 
lish Men  of  Letters."  He  also  contributed 
"  the  last  two  or  thi-ee  mixtures,  former  mixer 
having  lately  died." 

1  Stray  Whiffs  from  an  Old  Smoker,  Sept.,  1875. 

2  Charles  Baudelaire  on  Hasheesh,  October,  1875. 

3  Theophile  Gautier  as  Hasheesh-Eater,  Nov.,  187  5. 

4  A    French    Novel:      Un    Homme    Serieux,    by 

Charles  de  Bernard,  December,  1875. 

5  The  Fair  of  St.  Sylvester,  January,  1876. 

6  Saint  Amant.     Three  articles,  February,  March, 

April,  1876. 

7  Rabelais.     Four   articles,    June,    July,    August, 

October,  1876. 


Bibliography.  \  1 7 

8  Ben  Jonson.     Fourteen  articles,  November,  De- 

cember, 1876;  January,  February,  March, 
May,  June,  August,  September,  October, 
November,  December,  1877  ;  January,  March. 
1878. 

9  Rubaiyat  of  Omar  Khayyam,  March,  1877. 

10  "You  Love  Tobacco  Better,"  January,  1878. 

u     John    Wilson    and    the     Noctes     Ambrosianae. 
Two  articles,  April,  1878,  and  May,  1879. 

12  Tobacco    Smuggling   in    the   Last    Generation. 

Seven  articles,  May,  June,  July,  August,  Sep- 
tember, October,  November,  1878. 

13  The  Tobacco  Duties.     Three  articles,  Decem- 

ber, 1878;  January,  March.  1879. 

14  "  Social  Notes  "  on  Tobacco,  January,  1879. 

15  Tobacco  at  the  Opera,  February,  1879. 

16  Tobacco  Legislation  in  the  Three   Kingdoms. 

Thirteen  articles,  March,  .\pril,  September, 
November,  December,  1879;  January,  March, 
April,  May,  June,  August,  September,  No- 
vember, 1880. 

17  An   Old   New    Book   (The  Ordeal    of  Richard 

Feverel,  —  a  memorable  critique).  May,  1879. 

18  James   Hogg,,^  the   Ettrick    Shepherd.      Three 

articles,  August,  September,  October,  1879. 

19  George    Meredith's  New  Work   (The    Egoist), 

January,  1880. 

20  Walt    Whitman.      Five     articles,    May,    June, 

August,  September,  December,  1880. 

This  was  never  completed,  owing  to  the 
discontinuance  of  the  Plant;  but  two  other  arti- 
cles were  written,  which  are  still  in  MS. 


1 8  Bibliography. 


A  Sergeant's  Mess  Song,  November,  1880. 

In  additiou  to  these  he  contributed  to  a 
Christmas  publication  issued  in  connection 
with  the  PUmt  in  1878,  called  "  The  Plenipotent 
Key  to  Cope's  Correct  Card  of  the  Peerless  Pil- 
grimage to  Saint  Nicotine  of  the  Holy  Herb," 
"  The  Pilgrimage  to  Saint  Nicotine,"  in  verse; 
and  (probably)  the  introductory  "  Prologue  " 
in  prose. 


VI.     The  Liberal  (London). 
1879. 

In  the  Valley  of  Humiliation,  January. 

Two  Leaves  of  a  Fadeless  Rose  of  Love  (Two  ex- 
cerpts from  a  still  unpublished  poem  called 
"  Ronald  and  Helen  "),  January. 

Professor  Huxley  on  Hume,  March. 

Translations  from  Heine  (two  poems).  May. 

Meeting  Again,  June. 

The  Lover's  Return  (two  more  excerpts  from  "  Ron- 
ald and  Helen  "),  July. 

The  Purple  Flower  of  the  Heather  (reprinted  from 
Tait),  August. 

A  Strange  Book  (four  articles  on  Dr.  J.  J.  Garth 
Wilkinson's  Improvisations  from  the  Spirit), 
September,  October,  November,  December. 

The  Cypress  and  the  Roses  (reprinted  from  Tait), 
October. 


VII.    Progress  (London). 
1884. 
Bill  Jones  on  Prayer,  August. 

A  Real  Vision  of  Sin  (poem,  written  in  1859),  Nov. 
A  Graveyard  (epigram),  December. 


Bibliography.  119 


Supplement  to  the  Inferno,  February. 
1886. 

Siren's  Song,  March. 

A  Song  of  Sighing,  April. 

1887. 
Sarpalus  of  Mardon,  February,  March,  April,  May, 
June. 

This  Magazine  contains  many  reprints 
from  the  Secularist,  etc.,  which  it  has  not  been 
thouj?lit  necessary  to  specify. 


VIII.    Various  Magazines  and  Periodicals. 

1  Daily  Telegraph  (London)  : 

"  Middle  Class  Education,"  July  19,  1864. 

In  1864  he  had  written  two  or  three  articles 
for  the  Daily  Telegraph.     Salt's  Life,  p.  89. 

2  Frazer's  Magazine: 

Sunday  up  the  River,  October,  1869. 

3  National  Secular  Society's  Almanac  : 

Notes  on  Religious  Matters,  1872. 
Some  Anecdotes  of  Rabelais,  1876. 

4  New  York  World  : 

(Three  letters  in  August,  1873,  wei-e  contrib- 
uted by  Thomson,  from  Spain,  where  he  Imd 
been  sent  as  a  special  correspondent  to  report 
the  movements  of  the  Carlists.  Salt's  Life,  pp. 
98-102.) 


20  Bibliography. 

5  Fortnightly  Review: 

The   Deliverer,   November,   1881    (written   in 

i8S9)> 
A  Voice  from  the  Nile,  July,  1882. 
Proem,  February,  1892  (written  in  1882). 

6  Athen^um  : 

Notes  on  the  Structure  of  Shelley's  Prome- 
theus Unbound,  September  17,  24;  Octo- 
ber 8;  November  5,  19,  1881. 

7  Gentleman's  Magazine: 

"The  Ring  and  the  Book,"  December,  1881. 

8  Weekly   Despatch  : 


Law  V.  Gospel,  March  26. 

The  Old  Story  and  the  New  Storey,  April  2. 

The  Closure,  April  30. 

Despotism  tempered  by  Dynamite,  June  4. 

Browning  Society's  Transactions,  Part  I, 
1882: 
Notes  on  the  Genius  of  Robert  Browning, 


Bibliography.  1 2 1 

III 

CRITICISM  AND  BIOGRAPHY. 
I.     Books  and  Pamphlets. 

1  Amy  Levy's  "A  Minor  Poet,"  1884. 

(Tliomson  is  the  subject  of  the  leading 
poem.) 

2  The  English  Poets.     Edited  by  T.  H.  Ward,     ^y 

■    1885. 

(Notice  of  Thomson,  b}'  Philip  Bourke 
Marston.and  excerpts  from  the  "The  City  of 
Dreadful  Night,"  Vol.  IV.,  pp.  621-628.) 

3  A  Nirvana   Trilogy  ;    Three  Essays   on   the 

Career  and  the  Literary  Labors  of  James 
Thomson.  By  William  Maccall.  Crown 
Svo.,  pp.  32,  n.d.  [1886]. 

4  Stedman's  Victorian  Poets.     Latest  edition. 


5  Encvclop.^dia  Britannica.     Ninth  edition. 

(Notice  of  Thomson,    by   William    Sharp, 
1888.) 

6  Literary  Sketches.     By  H.  S.  Salt,  1888. 

(Contains  a  reprint  of  the  article  previously 
published  in  the  Gentleman's  Magazine.) 

7  The  Life  of  James  Thomson  (B.  V.),  with  a 

selection  from  his  Letters,  and  a  Study  of  his        ^ 
Writings.     By  H.  S.  Salt,  author  of  "  Liter- 
ary   Sketches,"    etc.      London:    Reeves     & 


J 


1 2  2  Bibliography. 

Turner,  196  Strand,  and  Bertram  Dobell, 
Charing  Cross  Road.  1889.  8vo.,  pp.  vii 
and  335,  with  a  portrait. 

(^One  thousand  copies  of  this  book  were 
printed^  but  six  hundred  of  them  were  destroyed 
by  fire.) 

8  Roses  and  Rue.     By  W.  Stewart  Ross,  1890. 

(Containing  the  author's  recollections    of 
Thomson.) 

9  The    Poets  and  Poetry  of   the   Century. 

Edited  by  A.  H.  Miles,  i  -if^z.  Vol.  V. 


II.    Articles  in  Magazines  and   Periodicals: 

1  Note  on  "  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night." 

Academy,  June  6,  1874. 

2  A   Necessitarian    Poet,   Spectator.     June   20, 

1874. 

3  Review  of  "The  City  of  Dreadful  Night." 

Athenceum,  May  i,  1880. 

4  Review  of  "  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night." 

Academy,  June  12,  1880. 

5  A  New  Poet.     By  G.  A.  Simcox.     Fortnightly 

Review,  July,  1880. 

6  Review  of  "The  City  of  Dreadful  Night." 

London  Quarterly  Review,  April,  1881. 

7  The  City  of  Dreadful  Night  and  Other 

Poems.     By  Philip  Bourke  Marston.    Modern 
Thought,  May,  1881. 

8  A  New  English  Poet.     By  Joel  Benton.    Ap- 

pleton's  Journal,  May,  1881. 

9  Obituary    Notice   of   Thomson.     By  Philip 

Bourke  Marston,  Athenceum,  June  10,  1882. 


Bibliography.  123 

10  James  Thomson  :  a  Study.     By  G.  G.  Flaws, 

Secular  Review,  June  24  and  July  I,  1882. 

11  A  Poet  of  To-day.     (James  Thomson.)     To- 

day, July,  1883. 

12  James  Thomson. —  I.  The  Man.  II.  The  Poet. 

By  G.  W.  Foote.  Progress,  April  and  June, 
1884. 

13  A    Great    Poet's    Prose.       By    S.     Briton. 

Progress,  December,  1884. 

14  The  Works  OF  James  Thomson  (B.  v.).     By 

•  H.  S.  Salt.  Gentleman's  Magazine.  June,  1886. 
(Reprinted  in  Salt's  ''Literary  Sketches,"  1888.) 

15  James  Thomson.     By  Arthur  C.  Hillier.  Dub- 

lin University  Review,  December,  1885. 

16  Childish   Recollections  of  James  Thom- 

son (B.  v.).  By  Hypatia  Bradlaugh  Bonner. 
Our  Corner,  August,  1886. 

17  Letters    of  James    Thomson.     By  Hypatia 

Bradlaugh  Bonner.     Our  Corner,  Sept.,  1886. 
iS     Why  James  Thomson  did  not  Kill  Him- 
spLF.     Spectator,  March  23,  '.889. 

19  Some    Extracts    from    James    Thomson's 

Note-Books.  By  H.  S.  Salt.  Scottish  Art 
Review,  Aijgust,  1889. 

20  Reviews  of  Salt's  "Life  of  James  Thom- 

son." AthencEum,  March  16;  Academy, 
April  13;  Agnostic  Journal,  April  6;  Satur- 
day Review,  May  18;  National  Reformer  (no- 
tice written  by  G.  W.  Foote),  March  31,  Apr. 
7,  14,  21 ;  The  Freethinker  (notice  written  by 
J.  M.  Wheeler),  February  10;  Watts'  Literary 
Guide  (notice  written  by  T.  R.  Wright),  April 
15,  May  15,  1S89. 


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